


Scepter

by Zarabethe



Category: Warcraft - All Media Types, Warcraft III, World of Warcraft
Genre: Alliance, F/M, Night Elves, Not Canon Compliant, Original Character(s), Warcraft - Freeform, cataclysm didn't happen, scepter of the shifting sands, warcraft classic
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-07-08
Updated: 2019-07-11
Packaged: 2020-06-24 10:47:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 12
Words: 37,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19722109
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zarabethe/pseuds/Zarabethe
Summary: Before the world was broken by Deathwing, a hunter and a warrior set off on a quest to find an ancient relic before it disappears from history forever. They face many arduous challenges along the way, but the most unexpected one, how to allow themselves to love without fear, proves to be the most difficult. Will they let obsession and a painful past drive them apart?





	1. Chapter 1

Sweat gathered in pools at the base of Zarabethe's neck and ran down her back, soaking her shirt. Her dark purple hair was starting to come loose from the braids she had looped on the back of her head, and strands blew around in the gritty wind. The heat that rolled off the desert was suffocating. All of this she ignored as she carefully chipped piece by minute piece off of the stone dais she was excavating. It was painstakingly slow work, but she seemed not to care as she carefully perched on the edge of the hole dug out around the structure. The dais was part of a larger piece, some kind of altar to an Old God built by the Qiraji. There were words carved around the base of the altar, and she was trying to carefully remove thousands of years of sand and buildup so they could be read and translated. This structure was not a very important one, out here in the middle of the Silithus desert instead of closer to Ahn Qiraj, the center of the Qiraji empire, but every piece was important in the discovery of history.

Several yards away in the shadow of a stone block, lay an enormous black nightsabre. Upon closer inspection, he was not quite solid black, but black stripes on dark grey, and on his muzzle and around his eyes was a dusting of slightly lighter grey, revealing his age. Old scars and healed wounds marked his flanks and back. He looked quite intimidating if you ignored the sound of snoring coming from his massive head.

All around the pair dwarves worked diligently on unearthing the structure. Sweat gleamed off of ruddy foreheads, sun reflected off beards of many colours. Shouts and curses rang out, as well as random bits of singing. The dwarves were in high spirits: they only had two more days left on this digsite before they could collect payment. Several of the younger dwarves were gathered in a circle, eating a meal and starting early on the ale. There was not much left to do besides cataloging and packing, and none of them were too enthusiastic about it. Blowing her bangs out of her eyes, Zarabethe kept working: she wanted to clear this inscription before they left, and if that meant skipping a meal or two she was going to do it. She'd be happy to work all night as well, but it was too hard to see, even by firelight, and she didn't want to accidentally destroy the markings she was trying to uncover.

The night elf remained nearly motionless as midday turned to evening. The dwarves got rowdier and rowdier as more of them put down their tools to join in the celebration. As the sky started to darken, an enormous shadow stopped his gentle snoring, stretched, and slowly ambled towards his engrossed master. He flopped down behind her with a thump, and whined deep in his throat.

"Almost done, Zar," she said without looking. It had become a tradition that each night she and Zar would take a run after the sun set. They usually started out slow the first night, learning the curves and shape of the land. Each night they went faster and faster, pushing themselves, memorizing the path until they traveled at breakneck speed, dodging predators and leaping dunes as if they had lived here their whole lives. As old as Zar was getting, he never faltered on their runs. Zarabethe felt a twinge in her chest as she once again thought of how she needed to retire Zar soon. Although she had many pets throughout her life as a hunter, Zar had been her companion for longer than any other. They moved together in a synchronous rhythm, anticipating the other's moves in a fight. But Zar was old, far older than any other pet she had ever had. She liked to take him on digsites as there was not a lot to do but lay in the sun, but for long journeys, she was beginning to prefer one of her more spry companions from her menagerie. Zar was a good cat: it was time for him to live out his life being pampered in the stables of Darnassus.

All this weighed on her mind as she cleaned up from the day's dig. She was nearly done uncovering the inscription and she would have plenty of time to finish in the morning before she helped pack up. She dusted the sand off her clothes as best she could, and tied her long braids back more securely. As she donned her pack for their run, she heard a crunching behind her, the sound of a stumbling gait on shifting sand.

"Won't ye be joining us around the fire then, lass?" came a loud slur. Zarabethe stifled a sigh. Although the dwarves were content to leave her be during the day, nearly every night as more ale was consumed, inevitably one would try to convince the lone night elf to drink with them. They probably draw lots after supper, she thought to herself irritably. She forced a light tone to her voice as she turned to answer.

"Unfortunately, no, I was just heading out to take Zar for his run." At the sound of his name, Zar appeared at her side. He leveled his eyes at the swaying dwarf.

"Jus' this once? Me an' the boys will be missin' yer pretty face," the dwarf grinned broadly and the scent of ale washed over her like a wave as he leaned closer. She couldn't keep a grimace off her face. Stouthelm was this one's name. He must be pretty far in his cups to think she would come anywhere near that ruckus. She made it very clear at the beginning of every dig, that she was to be left alone. She slept alone, excavated alone, took meals alone, and she did not drink socially. Beside each night's polite inquiry, her fellow archeologists did not usually have a problem adhering to these conditions. She worked very hard for the Explorer's League with the single-minded focus that she applied to her passion of history and discovery. They overlooked her quirks and never turned her down when she applied for a job. But some individuals could not seem to understand her need for privacy, sometimes escalating to a threat before relinquishing. She could tell this situation was quickly developing into the kind that had to be dealt with in force.

She sensed the movement before she actually saw it. In a flash she had deftly moved to the side of the dwarf's reaching hand, drawing her dagger. The dwarf blinked. He looked quite comical, frozen in place with one hand outstretched, staring at her dagger pointed at his chest with his mouth slightly open. He might have been reaching to take her hand, or even to just pat her on the arm, but the intent to touch her was obvious. Stouthelm swallowed loudly and stuttered.

"S-sorry, lass," he said with distinctively less slur to his words. "Ah'll just be joinin' me boys then and leave you to it." He backed up slowly, then turned and stumbled quickly to the group of dwarves gathered around the bonfire. She heard the roar of chatter die down minutely, then pick back up again as Stouthelm shook off the encounter and dove back into his ale. Zarabethe sheathed her dagger, then wiped her sleeve against her pant leg with a shudder. Her skin felt prickly with the anticipation of unwanted contact. Zar bumped his head against her hip, and she scrubbed his ears.

"Alright Zar, we're going." The run tonight would wipe the uneasiness from her mind. Bouncing on her heels for only a moment, she turned and took off, coming up to speed quickly as they sped through the now-familiar path. The wind was up tonight. Little eddies of sand swirled at their feet as they reached the top of a small dune and saw the town in the distance. It glowed for only a moment then winked out of sight as they dipped down into a valley. Zarabethe could hear the soft sound of Zar's massive paws on the sand behind her as she pushed herself faster and faster, as if she could outrun the flicker of anxiety that still trembled in her from the dwarf. She forced it away as always, focusing on the hidden rhythms of the world around her: the thudding sound of feet on sand, her breath steady and even, the wind blowing in her ears, her own heartbeat. Patterns and repeating motions steadied her mind, and the anxiety flowed away from the core of her being, like water sliding over rocks and through cracks, returning to the earth.

Dealing with anxiety was as familiar to her as breathing. Over the many years of her life she had developed a hardened will against the edges of madness at her brain. It was not something she ever discussed, but she had spent most of her childhood with her anxiety completely out of control. She could only remember snatches here and there of it, and none of it was good: hiding under her blanket in her closet for days to avoid people (the reasoning behind it had slipped away, leaving only the vague sense of people that made her anxious), pulling and yanking on her hair until she developed bald, bleeding spots (the pain was something she could focus her will on while the world swirled around her) and of course, the bees. Every night and some days she dreamed of bees swarming around her. Every single room she entered had to be searched top to bottom, but most of the time she just imagined she had missed them because she still heard their horrible, horrible buzzing. She spent so much time under a blanket hiding from the bees that entire chunks of her memories were dark. And then of course, were the people with bees inside of them. No one ever believed her, and in fact she barely believed herself, but she could always hear the buzzing the bees made whenever someone came close to her. She took her studies and training by herself, through books and sometimes private tutors (after she checked for bees of course) but they were still everywhere. She was always worried that really she was just crazy, and that she was just in denial of it.

It had taken a long time for her to realize that the bees weren't really there. When her anxiety ran high, and threatened to get out of control, she heard a buzzing in her ears that got louder and louder until the noise itself drove her mad. Over time, as she came up to the grey area between adolescence and early adulthood, she started to fight back. She began to be able to find the order in the chaos of the world: the patterns in the bark of the trees, the hidden tempo in the song of a bird, the music in footsteps, the pulsing beat of her heart. Her most powerful weapon, however, came from an unexpected source. Her mother had insisted from a young age that she learn to sew. It was her own profession, and as most of the time she just couldn't do anything at all with her young daughter, she figured she might as well learn a trade. Zarabethe hated it. She had no desire to create clothes or to do such menial tasks, but she found that sewing held a rhythm: a rhythm that she could hold in her hands and create whenever she needed. Although she never had the talent to piece together dresses or shirts, she could stitch designs on things all day long. The edges of all her sheets and blankets were covered in little leaves, flowers, and swirls, although her mother drew the line at her own clothes. Sometimes she even let Zarabethe embroider the edges of the clothes that people commissioned her to make. Sitting on the floor of her mother's sewing room, carefully stitching the hems of ornate robes and fancy dresses while her mother sewed at her table, was one of her favorite and calmest memories of home life.

Over time, with her arsenal at her disposal, she began to figure out her triggers, and what caused her the greatest distress. Although she could spend as much time as she wished with animals of all kinds (in fact preferring to spend her times in the stables and animal pens instead of the shops around town) people made her nervous. She imagined an invisible barrier between her skin and other people, like a shield, which helped, but anyone that touched her outer barrier dissolved it. Although she had long ago put aside such fancy, anyone that touched her still brought about an intense wave of anxiety. Touching skin-to-skin was her limit. With clothes or armor between them, she was okay, at least for a brief time, but touching someone's skin made her hide in the shower, scrubbing and scrubbing until every sensation of it was gone.

Hiding in books brought about her love for history and with it, figuring out puzzles. Although she was trained in marksmanship and survival, and had served in several wars (including the War of the Shifting Sands and the campaign in Northrend) her passion was right here, covered in sand and sweat, eking out the story of the past, piece by piece.

The lights of Cenarian Hold shown through the dusty darkness as the two approached the only evidence of civilization in this wasteland. The inn and small group of buildings clung to the side of a large sandy hill determinedly, providing shelter and amenities for the few visitors to the desert. They mostly consisted of archeologists, historians, and adventurers, there to gain favor with the local Cenarian Circle sect. She herself had spent many nights in that tavern shaking sand from her boots for that very reason. Tonight though, a single figure broke the desolate facade of the horizon. Zarabethe slowed, curious as to who'd be out on such wind-blown night. The figure appeared to be struggling against the wind and the sand. Probably too drunk to know where he was. As she came closer, slowing to a walk, she realized with a start she recognized the ancient night elf before her. In all the years that she had been traveling through Silithus for jobs or adventuring, Baristolth was a constant presence in the small town. A relic of a long-forgotten war, time and injuries had not been kind to him, and he did not appear to be completely right in the head. Often he was seen sleeping against the side of a building during the heat of the day, but at night he would often assail passers-by with war stories, tales of giant beetles and massive creatures that he had fought against. Sometimes he would sit around and babble to himself about dragons and their secret plots. Zarabethe found him mostly harmless and took pity on him often, leaving him something to eat or drink. Tonight though he seemed different: he was not shouting or raving, instead his forehead gleamed with perspiration and his movements were more erratic, weakened. His dark face seemed pale and his gold eyes wild as he stumbled along, muttering and clutching a large leather satchel. Zarabethe knew that he would probably die if left alone to the elements all night, so steeling herself she carefully grasped only his sleeve.

"Come on old man, let's get you to the tavern," she said, steering him back to town. He obediently turned and walked with her, swaying against the wind. The aroma that rolled off his clothes was pungent, and she wrinkled her nose and tried to hurry him along. They traversed without incident until they were nearly to the light shining on the ground from the doorway of the tavern, when Baristolth suddenly pulled up short.

"No!" he shouted, seeming to gain life again. He pulled his arm from her grasp, and pushed his ancient leather satchel in her face. "Anachronos needs this! I need to give it to him!"

He fell to muttering again, but he kept shoving the bag at her like his life depended on it. Wanting nothing more than to be away from this old man that was finally cracking, she took it and slung it over her shoulder.

"Yes, yes, Anachronos. Sure, no problem," she said, trying to direct him towards the tavern. The innkeeper often took pity on the old night elf and let him stay in an unoccupied room occasionally. He would definitely need supervision tonight.

"You'll bring this to him?" The old man pleaded with her. By Elune his breath was foul.

"Yes, fine, I will," she said, continuing to move him towards the tavern. He seemed to relax then and let himself be taken inside, stumbling as Calandrath took his arm and led him to an unoccupied corner of her inn. After settling him in with a blanket by the fire, the blue-haired night elf took Zarabethe aside.

"Thank you for bringing him in. He hasn't been himself for days—not eating, not sleeping unless I make him drink some peacebloom tea. I don't know where he drug that old bag out from, but he's been accosting people with it and no one has taken it yet. Would you mind terribly just disposing of it somewhere? There's no telling what's in it, but maybe it will give him some peace to not have to worry about it anymore." Calandrath glanced back at the old night elf where he leaned sagging against the wall. The light from the fire deepened the lines on his face, aging him even more than his many years. His eyes were closed and it was only the very shallow rise and fall of his chest that indicated he was even alive.

"For as long as he lasts." Calandrath shook her head and returned to the bar that she had been scrubbing when they had burst in. Zarabethe fingered the strap of the bag. The events of tonight had piqued her interests in the contents of the old man's satchel, and if she was asking her to take it...might as well indulge that fantasy.

"I'll see it makes it to its proper location."


	2. Ironforge

Baristolth's satchel of papers stayed at the front of Zarabethe's thoughts as she approached the enormous mountain that contained the underground city of Ironforge. The dwarven capital was even busier than usual: the dwarves' biggest holiday, Brewfest, was only a few weeks away, and people from around Azeroth were already arriving to set up shop and prepare their wares for the event. Normally the crowd would bother her enough that she would return at a quieter time, but she had another agenda after picking up her pay from the Explorer's League headquarters: she wanted to dive into their immense historical library and see how their records compared with the information contained in her bags. She nimbly threaded her way through a crowd mostly shorter than herself, making her way through to the imposing gates to the city. A massive statue of a dwarf dual-wielding hammers came to her vision long before she got there. She always snorted a bit to herself when she saw those gates...only a diminutive race would build such a statue to greet its visitors. She kept a close eye on Zar as they entered the noisy throng: he hated crowds even more than she did, and he seemed to have gotten a bit testy in his advanced age. They managed to make it through the front gates into the city without Zar taking off any gnome heads or eating any small children only to pull up short: the main thoroughfare was PACKED. Vendors hauling goods, old friends calling to each other, everywhere raucous dwarf laughter and enthusiastic shouts. She stood for a minute, floundering, until she spied the door leading into the business section of the city surrounding the Great Anvil. It was relatively empty. Keeping one hand on Zar's back, they maneuvered their way past a group of two draenei and a human appearing to have a hatchet throwing contest at a keg of ale. The owner of said keg was oblivious as he was shouting his wares to the people swarming past. A robust dwarven lady steered her three children hurriedly past Zar's scowl. All three of them were topped with a mass of bright red curls. Zarabethe smiled as the smallest, a girl, reached up to pat Zar's head before being grabbed by her mother. Zar's look of indignation was priceless. She scrubbed him between the ears as they reached the arched doorway leading farther underground.

"You know, Zar, if you weren't just so approachable, then you could avoid that sort of thing," she laughed at the ill-tempered nightsabre. The sound of metal on metal and a wave of heat met her as they entered into the massive cavern in the center of the dwarven city. Here was the real heart of the city: a swarming mass of blacksmiths, trainers, miners, and engineers scattered around The Great Forge. Amidst the clanking, hissing, and shouting of wares, Zarabethe was surprised to see a tall figure weaving among the vendors with a bag thrown over his shoulder. His violet skin and long ears were as out of place in the dwarven city as she was: but his shock of brilliant white hair was his identifying feature. She called to him as she made her way around the circular pathway. He looked up, his normally-stoic face breaking into a grin as she reached the booth he stood at.

"Hey, Zara," Elforen greeted her, striding towards the hunter through a throng of gnomes. Her breath caught in her throat as she saw him reach to embrace her and she deftly stepped out of it with one hand raised.

"Nice to see you again, Elf, " she said quickly, and smiled, hoping to diffuse the slight hurt and confused look that crossed his face when she avoided him. Most people who tried to touch her ended up with an dagger to their throat, but Elforen knew her better than anyone, and she waited patiently for him to remember.

"Sorry about that," he apologized quietly. "It's been awhile since I've seen you. Hey Zar," he bent down to scratch the nightsabre behind the ears. Zar permitted himself to be petted with a long-suffering look. An awkward silence grew between the two night elves as Elforen stood and adjusted the bag thrown over his shoulder, looking anywhere but her.

"What are you shopping for?" she asked, trying to change the subject. What had suddenly changed in Elforen that they were uncomfortable with each other? He seemed relieved when she spoke.

"Picking up some raw ore for the shop." He knelt down and pulled open the drawstring of the leather bag. Light from the Great Forge glinted off of the dark rocks inside. "There are some good pieces of thorium and mithril in here: much better quality than what we find around Stormwind."

"Probably cheaper, too," she added under her breath, but her mind was already refocusing on the quest burning in her mind. From what she remembered, the section of the library on the Dragonflights was minimal, mostly concentrated around the Dragonsoul and then the subsequent fall of Neltharian into Deathwing. The Bronze Dragonflight and their enygmatic leader were so secretive that not even the Explorer's League knew much beyond what was common knowledge. As it was, the dwarves tended to stick to their own history, and origins of Azerothian species. She saw that the entrance to the Hall of Explorers (and the library contained within) was much less crowded than the main thoroughfare. She realized belatedly that Elforen had launched into a theory on how dwarves found the better veins of metal and tried to catch up, nodding her head as he slung the parcel back over his shoulder. "So anyway, I'm pretty much done here. I'll be starting back to Stormwind in the morning. I don't have to be back for two days, but I'd rather hire a mount and skip the gryphon flight." Zarabethe chuckled along with him; neither of the night elves were fond of flying. "So what business do you have in Ironforge?" he asked as they started picking their way out of the booths lining the walkway to the Great Forge. "I'm assuming you're not here for Brewfest."

"Of course not." Zarabethe wrinkled her nose. She had enough problems keeping her concentration balanced without imbibing alcohol. "Just picking up a paycheck from a digsite."

Elforen glanced sideways at her, one long eyebrow arched. "That's it?"

She rolled her eyes. "And to visit their library."

Although they had vastly different jobs during the Northrend campaign, they were both based in the same barrack in Borean Tundra. Elforen had many times come in from training to find Zarabethe fast asleep in an immense text, trying to cram as much information into her head as possible before her body gave out on her. She had helped the Explorer's League excavate the massive titan structure that was Ulduar, while Elforen served in the armies fighting against the Lich King. As he was more comfortable around the humans and dwarves than their own kind, and she kept to herself as much as possible, they quickly took to watching out for each other, partnering in the frequent attacks to the base, waiting for when the other returned from their missions. She hadn't seen much of him in the months since they had returned: he was busy working the blacksmithing shop in Stormwind for the military, and she had been hopping from digsite to digsite, collecting artifacts and texts to compare with the knowledge brought back from Ulduar. It felt comfortable to fall in step beside him again. "I've got some personal research to do before I head out again, as soon as possible. Far too many people here for my taste."

"I completely understand," Elforen agreed. For a moment his silver eyes caught hers, and she stopped as a strange feeling flickered through her chest. She blinked, shaking her head a little, and saw confusion mirrored on the other night elf's face. For one, long moment, she forgot which direction she had been walking, and why it was even important to get there. Background noise faded to a haze as she was caught in an emotion completely unfamiliar to her. One minute passed, unnoticed.

Three dwarves engaged in a loud conversation bumped into them and continued on, breaking the revery. Zarabethe realized both she and Elforen had been standing stock still in the main walkway, and laying a hand on Zar, stepped out of the way. The sight of the arches indicating the library returned her to her senses, and the moment passed from her mind. She started to turn that way, but Elforen quickly interjected a question.

"So, I know you're in a hurry, but do you think you'll have time to join me for supper later?" The other night elf seemed reluctant to let her go just yet. Zarabethe frowned, weighing choices. The puzzle contained in the satchel was screaming at her to be solved. But a part of her held onto that strange, disorienting feeling, and whispered to stay, just for a moment longer. This part was small though, and easily ignored.

"Possibly. I need to get started researching though, so I'm going to head to the library. If you want to catch up later, you know where I'll be," she smiled absently, then waved as she turned towards the arches of the library's entrance, Zar in her wake. She didn't see Elforen's gleaming eyes follow her until she left his sight.

*****

It was well past eight o'clock when Elforen realized he had been subtly watching the main thoroughfare for the other night elf. He had been sitting at his table for quite some time, keeping his mind busy: going over the ore in his bag, making marks on his supply list, staring at his cup of coffee, mentally calculating the vacation he had built up, counting the cracks on the floor. Thinking of some of the worn down equipment in the blacksmith shop and what he could do to repair it. By the time he decided he was done waiting, he had rebuilt the entire shop in his head, improved upon the inner workings of the forge, and planned a great deal of new weapons he could make with the better equipment.

He considered just getting some food and returning to his room above the inn. It was getting late, and he still had preparations to make before he left in the morning to head back. In fact, he wasn't sure why he was waiting at all: he knew she wouldn't come. She had that pre-occupied look in her eye and wouldn't give in until she had found everything she needed to on the subject, be it hours, days, or weeks submerged in piles of books and scrolls. He stood, slung his satchel over his shoulder, tipped the red-headed barmaid, and headed up to his room. Once there, he started to sort his bags and pack the ore away more carefully for the journey, but he found himself distracted. He found the silence of the single room pressing in on him, almost louder than the crowded room below. He realized he had been folding the same shirt over and over and in frustration threw it on to the bed. He gazed around the contents of his sparse room as he stood and paced. The small bag containing his belongings: change of clothes, sharpening stones for his arsenal of weapons, single bedroll. One cup, one plate, one bare set of camping equipment. Even the stash of ore, piled in corner and half-packed to travel, seemed to be lonely. He sat back down on the bed. This was ridiculous. He had always been alone. He had CHOSEN to be alone. He had spent many years doing things on his own time, in his own way. He needed no one's approval, and especially not their companionship. So what was wrong with him that he suddenly felt like following this girl around? Zarabethe was as independent and self-sufficient as they came: a quality he admired in himself as well. She didn't need his protection, and she barely seemed interested in his friendship except for that of convenience.

As he lectured himself in his head, he continued packing his things. What could he possibly gain from pursuing her? Just someone else to reject him when he needed them. Not again. Satisfied with his arguments, he slapped the lid on the package containing the ore down firmly. The hollow sound filled the entire room, then everything was quiet again. With no more distractions, he felt the tendrils of a terrible loneliness dig their way into his thoughts again. When he had left his family to follow the path of the warrior so many years ago, their displeasure in his choice had caused what felt like a great hole inside of him. Where he had been surrounded by numerous family members his entire life, now he had no one but himself to rely on. For a long time he missed them horribly, but as time went on he grew used to his solitude. A stranger in the Alliance army, there were no night elves in the company besides him. Eager to be free from the name of the family that was ashamed of him, he took the nickname thrust upon him, Elf, and made himself a new name, Elforen. That had been so long ago that if anyone referred to him by his old name, he would pass them by. The pain had dulled through many years of military service, keeping his mind busy with dedication to the cause. When kal'dorei had officially allied themselves with Stormwind, and other night elves began to join the ranks, it did not bother him to distance himself from them. He was not of their own kind anymore. Zarabethe had been the anomaly: most of the other kaldorei had hung together in a pack. She stayed away from everyone, preferring to spend her time hidden in books or training alone. It had been she that had sought him out at first as a partner on defense of the encampment, remaining silent and nearly invisible in the tree above him, carefully picking out targets for her arrows as he lured them to her deadly aim. They had formed a quiet kind of friendship, never pushing any boundaries. When the campaign ended, they had parted ways with only a wave and a pleasant word. He had hardly thought of her since, instead burying himself in the smithy, working long hours until he collapsed exhausted in his bed each night. The white-haired night elf rubbed his hands over his eyes and glanced around the room again. Perhaps he was just trying to keep his mind from being idle.

Making a decision, he stood and strode determinedly out of the room, locking the door behind him. If he was this distracted, he wouldn't be able to sleep. He knew someone else not likely to be sleeping either, and he was hurting nothing by catching up on old times.

"So, the Bronze Dragonflight?"

Zarabethe looked up to see Elforen standing by the table she had covered with books and scrolls holding two plates of food. She stared at it uncomprehending, until her stomach rumbled and she realized she hadn't eaten since the morning. She quickly made some space, shoving two scrolls about the life and mating habits of dragons to the floor. Elforen set the plates on the table and pulled up a stool across from her.

"Uh, yes," she affirmed lamely as she ran her finger down the text to find where she had been reading. She marked her spot with a piece of paper and moved it aside. She rubbed the grit out of her eyes as she tried to remember how long she had been sitting there absorbed in her research. The hours had all run together as usual. By the ambiance in the city though, it was very late: after dark at least. She poked at the food on her plate: it was typical dwarven fare, a hearty dish of lamb and potatoes covered with a thick gravy, and she was nearly too pre-occupied to eat, but she took a few bites to appease her appetite. She was surprised to find it flavorful, if a bit greasy.

"Thank you for bringing me supper, Elforen," she said distractedly. Her eyes stole back to the pages of notes in a stack beside her. "I've been too wrapped up in reading to keep track of what time it was."

"I figured as much," he said as he ate his own meal. He did a poor job of hiding his grin behind his fork.

She ignored it as she launched into her story. "While I was in Silithus working on one of the Ahn'Qiraj sites, I would take Zar for a run every night near Cenarion Hold. There was this crazy old man there, sometimes yelling at people that went by, sometimes he was passed out, but he was always there. One night I saw him stumbling around at the edge of town looking confused. At first I thought he was drunk, then I realized he was unwell. Zar and I escorted him back into town by the inn, hoping they would take him in for the night, but he insisted on telling me about a parcel of papers he had that he was supposed to pass on to some adventurer. He claims they were from Anachronos." She leaned back in her chair.

"The Guardian of the Caverns of Time?" Elforen frowned. "He's not exactly friendly; I once saw a group of Horde try and lure him away from his post so they could get a better look at the entrance: burned to a crisp, every single one. He'd be more likely to roast someone than to give them a quest."

"That's what I thought," she agreed. "But he was so insistent that I take the bag, I did just to get him to go into the inn and get some help. We broke camp and left early that morning, but I started looking through it on the way back here, and I'm not sure he wasn't telling the truth." She swept the scrolls littering the table to the floor and opened Baristolth's bag on the table. It looked to have once been very sturdy, possibly made of dragonscale, but was very old. The papers and maps it held hummed with magic as Elforen thumbed through them carefully. "Some if it is written in old Darnassian, and this portion down here appears to be Draconic. The instructions at the top say to collect these certain fragments of silithid carapaces and bring them, along with this parcel, to Anachronos. I've been scouring books on the Bronze Dragonflight all afternoon with no luck, but just before you came in I think I found a clue: there's a portion right here written in old Qiraji." Her silver eyes glowed with excitement. "I think this describes where Fandral Staghelm scattered the remains of the Scepter of the Shifting Sands."

Understanding dawned on Elforen's face as he quickly scanned the maps in his hands. "You might be on to something here. But the Qiraji were defeated a long time ago: there's no need to retrieve the Scepter now." He handed her back the papers.

She carefully shut them back in the bag. Her mind was spinning. "But think of the history surrounding this discovery! A lot of this information was thought to be lost, and here I have possibly the only gateway into finding it again. I need to at least take this to Anachronos, and see what he has to say." Her mind was already far away, planning travel details. "I can pick up the silithid carapaces in Tanaris; there's still one hive there that hasn't been completely uprooted. I can catch a boat to Theramore from Stormwind..." she trailed off as she started jotting down notes on a scrap of parchment.

Elforen watched as the other night elf became completely lost in her own head. She was quite a sight: quills tucked behind her long, graceful ears, a smudge of ink on her cheek, her dark violet hair escaping from her customary braids. Her food lay forgotten on her plate as she consulted several scrolls at once, making notes and muttering to herself. Without thinking, he reached forward to wipe the ink off with his thumb. Zarabethe started, jerking her head back and staring at him with wide, almost panicked eyes. He was instantly apologetic.

"You had ink on your face," He showed her his hand where it was smudged. She half-smiled, wiping at her own face before turning back to her paper, but the slightly wild, child-like look was still on her face. She stole a nervous glance at him, catching him staring at her. He saw the wall come down over her eyes, and the vulnerability in her face vanished, replaced with a hardened determination. She very deliberately focused on her travel plans and the rest of the world could have dropped away for all she would have known. While normally he would have backed off immediately, he was filled with nothing but intrigue: there was something to her underneath the tough barricade she had built. He thought of all the time he had put in at the smithy lately, trying to escape his own thoughts. He was due some time off. Maybe he could lend her a hand in her quest, and figure himself out in the process.

"So when do we leave?"

Zarabethe's head shot up and she stared at him incredulously. He suddenly felt unsure.

"That is if you wouldn't mind some company. I've been stuck at the shop for weeks now, and I've been meaning to get away for awhile. After I drop this ore off, I can leave anytime I want." He had been looking to the side as he spoke, and he brought his eyes up to hers in the last sentence. She looked as if she were considering it, so he continued, adopting a teasing tone. "You might need a hand when you ask a hostile dragon about a thousand year old quest that might or might not exist."

"I can probably handle a dragon by myself," she retorted. Her eyes, gleaming with challenge, held his for a moment. He leaned back in his chair, casually crossing his arms behind his head.

"Then you won't mind me tagging along to see if you get a little crispy around the edges." He left his offer on the table. After a moment's deliberation, she took it.

"I doubt he'll even get that close," she smirked. All previous questions had vanished, and now they were back to how they were in Northrend: a deadly pair on equal footing. Elforen smiled. This should prove to be an enjoyable vacation.


	3. Mountain Pass

Light had just started to trickle through the tree tops when Zarabethe's eyes flew open. She lay still for a moment, confused on what had woken her early. Without moving her head, she surreptitiously glanced around their small encampment under her eyelashes. Zar lay curled at her feet, snoring as usual. Across the cooling embers of the campfire was Elforen completely rolled up in his blankets, with only the tips of his ears poking out. The trees surrounding them were quiet, and the air was cold and still. Barely a wind swirled the light dusting of snow on the ground. She breathed slowly, mimicking sleep, for a long count to sixty. Nothing happened, except her legs started to ache from holding them tense. Quietly she stood to get a better look around. She pulled her thick cloak tight around her as she stomped her feet, stimulating warmth into them. She and Elforen had been lucky: the mountain held a very minimal amount of snow for this time of year, and they had passed easily into the south side of the range before stopping to make camp. It was still very cold though, and she squatted down to stoke the fire. It was nearly daybreak, and an early start would not be the worst of plans.

As she held her fingers close to the struggling flames, she poked at her memories for what had woken her. She had been dreaming, she believed, but the details were quickly fading. Trees. The soft downy floor of the forest. She had been dreaming of Ashenvale. Her lips curved slightly as mentally, she tried to grasp hold of the sense of peace that accompanied her memories of Ashenvale forest. It was her homeland, and far up in the branches of its ancient limbs is where she would disappear when the world grew too much for her to bear. Warmth spread through her, not just in her hands and knees near the fire, but from somewhere deep in her belly. Her face relaxed more into her smile. Beautiful, peaceful, Ashenvale. She had been away too long. She had barely stayed long enough to immerse herself in its solitude after the campaign in Northrend before she had rushed off again, inflamed with all the knowledge gained in Ulduar, and desperate to compare it to the ruins the Explorer's League was uncovering in Tanaris.

The bloom of fire in her belly grew hotter, peaked, and blossomed into a sharp pain. A gasp flew out of her mouth in surprise, and she quickly turned from the fire, bending over her arm held tight to the front of her jerkin. She swallowed drily, sure she was going to be sick. After a tense moment of internally wrestling with her nausea, the pain settled into a heavy, throbbing ache. Not entirely trusting her stomach, Zarabethe held still, keeping her arm crossed against her. She thought back through yesterday. The food they had caught (two wild rabbits) had been cooked very thoroughly. And Elforen was obviously not ill. She had not been injured on their climb through the mountain trees: in fact it had been exhilarating, and she had found herself pushing her speed a little farther than usual, competing with the other Night Elf for the lead on the trail. Both her footing and her mount's had been sure, though; no falls or slips on the snow. Gingerly she moved her arm and felt around her belly. Her womb burned with a curious sort of ache: gently she pressed her palm against it. An electric pulse jolted through her, causing her to shift and squeeze her legs together uncomfortably. An embarrassing thought started to form in her head and she sat up sharply, pulling her breath in, but otherwise ignoring her insubordinate abdomen. She crouched next to a small drift of snow, and taking a handful, threw it into her face. The freezing shock of wet snow on her warmed skin snapped her out of it and she felt more in control. Shaking her head a bit to clear it, she began to roll up her sleeping pallet and pack her things as Elforen stirred across the fire from her. She had no idea what had brought this on, but a sneaking suspicion had formed in the back of her head and she wanted time to think it through before they reached Stormwind that evening.

*****

Elforen woke to the bustle of Zarabethe neatly and efficiently taking down camp. It was sooner than they agreed to wake, but she had obviously been awake even earlier, as the fire blazed warm in front of his face. Grudgingly he threw his blanket off and untangled his cloak from his legs before pulling it tight around him. He'd be happy to shelter in a much warmer location this evening. Automatically he folded his bedroll and packed it away before crouching in front of the fire.

"Up early?" he called to the other night elf as a greeting. She nodded absently, not even looking his way as she sorted through the things in her pack. He watched her lips move silently as she counted out the papers and supplies tucked inside. A half-smile flickered across his face as she numbered them off one, two, and finally three times. Only then did she close her pack and look up at him. He poked at the fire with a stick, pretending to not have noticed her obsessive habit.

"There is some wild hare leftover from last night. You're welcome to it." She flicked her fingers at the small bundle buried in the snow to keep it fresh. He retrieved it and tore the remaining piece in half. Biting down on his piece, he offered the other one to her; she visibly paled, and shook her head. He shot her a look as he settled back down next to the fire. She ignored it as she stood to check on the rams they had rented from Kharanos. Mountain rams were not his favorite choice of mount at all. They smelled foul, and their hair was oily and matted. It seemed to leave a greasy residue on everything it touched. He always felt he could not bathe enough after riding one. But they were impeccable climbers, and easily withstood the bitter cold winds of the mountains they were born in. Taking any other mount right over the mountain pass and down the other side would have been foolhardy.

Elforen quickly finished his breakfast and grabbed his gear. He was already packed. He had always kept the habit of being ready to run at a moment's notice, and serving in Stormwind Military had honed that ability to perfection. Taking only a moment to strap his massive axe to his back more securely, he joined her saddling up the rams for the journey. His mount, the white one, was already saddled and ready to go. She was clipping leaves off the edges of the bushes around her. Hers, the dark grey, was being feisty this morning and trying to butt the purple-haired Night Elf with his horns. He strode forward and caught the mountain ram by the reins, holding his head still while Zarabethe fastened his saddle on. He did not settle though, and stomped his front hoof impatiently, and tried to pull his head loose. Elforen laid a leather gloved hand on his nose, and spoke quietly to him.

"Easy, easy there," he soothed the animal. He stilled and reluctantly let himself be saddled. Elforen glanced over at Zarabethe as she quickly buckled the bags on the side. She looked unnerved by the ram's behavior. It was no wonder, as she normally had a special way with animals, mounts especially.

"This one's acting odd this morning," he remarked casually. Zarabethe finished and stepped back quickly, nodding her head. She eyed the ram warily.

"Usually the mounts try to buck me off, while yours is butter in your hands. Sometimes I think you work your animal magic on them, just to get a laugh." He teased her lightly, and she responded with a wan, tight-lipped smile. He gave her a penetrating look as she grasped the horn of the saddle and pulled herself up in one smooth movement. Something was off with her this morning. Zarabethe was not a very talkative travel-mate, but he could usually coax at least a little conversation out of her. This morning she was quiet and closed off, unusually pale, and the animals were skittish around her. Well, this one at least.

The mount in question was obviously unhappy to have Zarabethe on his back. He swung his head back and forth, and even reared up sharply, before continuing to stomp his hooves in agitation. Zarabethe was trying to calm him, speaking to him in Darnassian, but he was having none of it. Elforen grabbed his reins again, close to his head, and held him still.

"Do you have anything strange in your pack, maybe something that smells threatening?" he called to her as he petted the ram on the nose, trying to calm him. Zarabethe wrinkled her forehead in confusion.

"No, I just checked it, everything is the same as yesterday..." her voice trailed off and two very pink spots appeared high on her cheeks. Was she blushing? She avoided his curious eyes as she immediately slid off the ram's back and backed several feet away. The ram stopped his stomping and was obedient once more.

"He seems to behave well for you, how about we switch today?" Her voice was light, but he wasn't fooled one bit. There must be something she was hiding in her pack. He made a mental reminder to check it when next they stopped. If it was upsetting the mounts, then it could possibly draw wild animals near them, or other unsavory beings. He pulled himself up on the dark grey mount and waited as she did the same to the white. It seemed to take the switch of riders in stride, and they both started picking their way down to the warmer Human lands below.

*****

Zarabethe urged the white mountain ram faster as they made their way down the mountain to flatter ground. If they pushed it, they would reach the outskirts of Stormwind by nightfall. Behind her, she could hear Elforen occasionally struggle with his mount. The dark grey ram hadn't fully recovered from his fit this morning, and was in a foul mood. The tips of her ears burned as she recalled his outright refusal to carry her on his back. She suspected it was because her scent was changing, and he could sense it.

From before she had been born sometime during the first War of the Shifting Sands, her people had always been immortal. Societal constraints had been different back then: most of the men chose the life of a druid, while the capable women took up the titles of warrior, huntress, and high priestess. While the men slept in the Emerald Dream, the women guarded the borders of their lands from trolls, marauders, and anyone else that threatened their trees or their way of life.

As was the case with immortality, their ability to conceive and carry a child slowly faded away. Most of them never gave it a second thought: after all, it was Elune's will and nature's way to find a balance. If the Kal'dorei were never to age and die, then they would quickly overpopulate and overstress the ecosystem that they protected. All of that had changed at the Battle of Mt. Hyjal. With Archimonde and the Burning Legion bearing down on Nordrassil, the Kal'dorei, led by Tyrande and Malfurion, sacrificed their beloved World Tree, and as a result, gave up their immortality. That had been several years ago, and slowly, one by one, the younger Night Elves at least, were starting to regain their fertility.

Zarabethe expertly steered the white ram around a patch of loose rock. She usually never spared a thought for her own reproductive processes (or anyone else's, for that matter). After all, it was difficult to imagine being intimate with anyone when merely the thought of standing near them made her skin crawl. But she had experienced the process firsthand in Northrend when a younger priest became belligerent and unable to control her emotions, and none of the animals would carry her into battle. Zarabethe had been in one of her typical, out of sight perches at the top of the stair as she watched the priest being led out of the Barracks, sobbing. She heard whispers later that she had even made advances at one of the higher ranking officers, and when she had been spurned, she flew into a rage and had to be confined. Hers was a rare case: for most the shift was gradual, sometimes with no noticeable symptoms. Even then, the chance to conceive during the proper window was rare. If not for their excellent survival skills, the entire race was in danger of dying out.

Still, she'd be glad when the process was over and her scent stabilized. What a waste, she thought to herself with a wry smile. Granting fertility to one determined to remain alone.

Elforen caught up then, cursing his belligerent mount. She nearly reached out to grab his reins and help steady him, then drew her hand back and turned her eyes forward again. More likely than not, she'd only make things worse. Instead she pointed ahead to their goal: an out-of-the-way tavern tucked into small nearly horizontal plain near the mountain's foot. It promised warmth, a hot meal, and more importantly, behind it was a large, well-used stable.

"We'll trade these two in for a pair of horses up there," she called to her traveling companion. He only grunted in agreement, using all of his focus to keep control of the increasingly restless ram. She'd go by herself to get them this time, and make sure they were both female, and not bothered by her scent. Their next stop after this was Stormwind, and then a long boat ride. Hopefully by the time they were to set out from Theramore, the change would be complete and she would no longer have to be wary of animals. Fortunately Zar seemed not to care: he followed along behind as faithful as always. Of course, he was probably too old to be bothered. Zarabethe's brow furrowed as once again she was reminded of the cat's age. She would just have to watch for him as they traveled and remember not to push him too far. Having an unreliable animal companion made her a bit uneasy. For the first time, she felt grateful for Elforen inviting himself along. Although she was still getting used to traveling with another sentient being, she found they were meshing well together, falling into step as they had in Northrend.

The grey ram, clearly taxed to the limit of his patience, pulled up short. Elforen grabbed wildly at his horns to avoid flying face-first into the snow. Despite herself, Zarabethe laughed as she brought her ram to a halt as well. Elforen yanked the reins, slapped the ram on the rump, and dug his heels in.

"Go, you damned beast!" The ram completely ignored him.

Elforen slid off ungracefully, muttering under his breath as he untied the saddle bags and secured his possessions back to his own pack. He turned to her as she dismounted as well and pointed at the smirk on her face as he grabbed the reins on the ram to lead him in.

"I see the look on your face. I know you have something to do with this." His voice was stern but his eyes were dancing with amusement. He yanked at the reins and turned to the road up ahead. "Get going, you smelly dwarven ram. The sooner I am rid of you the better."

Still smiling, Zarabethe joined him in leading her own mountain ram, and together the two headed to the tavern ahead.


	4. Stormwind

The two horses acquired at the tavern were calm of temperament and swift of foot, and the pair made good time. They approached the entrance of Stormwind just before the sun sank below the horizon. Zarabethe breathed a sigh of relief as they were nodded through the guards at the gates. Her belly ached again, and she wanted nothing more than to take a mug of hot tea to a quiet corner of the Royal Library and read through her notes until sleep claimed her. She wondered briefly how the newly added history section compared to the vast dwarven equivalent as they turned into the city proper.

The main thoroughfare of the city was a bustling hub as vendors packed their stalls up for the night and patrons hurried to make last minute purchases. A stiff wind blew in from the harbour and circled the fountain, before rushing off to playfully scatter hats and papers before it. It smelled of the sea, salt and a slight hint of fish. The breeze had nothing on the smell of the inhabitants, though. As a relatively short lived race, humans did everything with an enthusiasm and an intensity that made up for their lack of years. Zarabethe wrinkled her nose as she guided her mount through the archway leading to the canals. The city was awash in the pungency of their determination to burn out their lives like a brilliant but doomed star. Some might find it invigorating, but it only served as a reminder to the night elf just how many people were in close proximity to her fragile shell. She found herself tapping her saddle rhythmically as the two made their way to the stables at the back of Old Town. It was a little too crowded and overbearing for her nerves, especially with her mind already on edge. She thought again longingly of silent rows of books and comfortable chairs, and she couldn't dismount and turn over care of her horse fast enough to the man in charge of the stables.

She kept the rhythm of her tapping going with her toe inside her boot as she shouldered her pack and turned impatiently to Elforen. He tipped the stableman and instead of following her, leisurely engaged him in conversation. She stared at the back of the night elf's white mane incredulously: she was about to lose her mind, and her traveling companion was conversing about the weather. After several interminable minutes she cleared her throat pointedly. The other night elf looked up in surprise.

"I'm going to secure a room at The Golden Keg," she said. And then off to solitude, she added in her head.

Elforen nodded, clearly a little annoyed at her impatience. "I need to stop by the smithy in the morning, so I'll meet you at noon at the harbour?"

She was already leaving the stable area behind. She absently waved behind her as she slipped into the crowded road through Old Town and made a beeline for the Dwarven District with Zar at her heels. She would stop by the inn, grab some food and her tea, then absorb herself in history until her anxiety eased. She could feel the satchel's presence over her shoulder, a slight magical hum. And then tomorrow, finally on the way to start the quest burning in her mind.

*****

Darkness had fallen in the human capital by the time Elforen reached the alley that contained his apartment. After getting an approximation of the weather they were about to be sailing on, and then dropping the ore off at the shop, he had decided to forego trying to drag Zarabethe away from her books tonight and just headed home. After spending the last two days with her, the walk seemed strangely empty. He snorted to himself. He wasn't sure why he was wasting time missing her, when it was pretty obvious earlier how eager she was to be by herself. He pushed that thought away from the front of his mind. He wasn't just chasing after her on this quest, he was there for the adventure. And he was genuinely interested in seeing if the famed bronze dragon would have anything to say about the mysterious satchel, or if he would add dragon slaying to his list of achievements.

Lost in his thoughts, he almost missed the cord wrapped around his door handle as he took it to enter his apartment. He paused in mid step, silently unhooking the clip of his throwing axe and grasping it under his cloak. He glanced either way and listened, but he could sense nothing else out of place. Carefully he unwound the leather strap from the door handle and held it up to the scant moonlight. The piece of polished metal hanging from it was worn, as if it had been rubbed many times for luck, but he could still make out the faint outline of a paw print. With a hand that was not as steady as it had been a moment ago, he turned the pendant over. At the very edge, the letters T.W. were scratched into the metal. All the air left his lungs as if he had been punched in the gut. Holding tight to the necklace, he looked up and down the street again. It was disturbingly quiet. He called a name out to the darkness, but it came out a choking whisper. He cleared his throat and tried again.

"Lorel?"

Only the wind answered him. He turned in a full circle, then feeling a little lost, opened the door to his apartment and stepped inside. A flurry of wings followed him in, and he was so on edge he ducked and cursed at the same time. Pulling the door shut behind him, he searched the inside of the tiny room, expecting to find a bat or an owl trapped inside. Instead, he met a pair of mischievous gold eyes above the wardrobe.

"There are disappointingly few places to hide in your apartment, Brother."

The petite night elf attached to the golden eyes giggled as he stood there for a moment, gaping like a fish. When Elforen managed to speak, he said the first thing that popped in his head. "Does Mother know you are here?"

The glowing eyes shifted slightly to the side as Lorel hopped down to the floor. "More or less."

She must have seen the lecture stirring in his face because she pulled herself up to her full height and glared at him. "I am not a child, Talrend. I have passed the Druidic trials. I don't have to ask permission from anyone anymore."

Elforen chuckled weakly and shook his head. "No, I guess you don't." He pulled her into a one-armed embrace and smiled fondly at his little sister. "Oh how I've missed you, Lorel."

The grin returned to her face and she hugged him back. "I've missed you too, Brother."

Elforen realized he was still holding the amulet he had fashioned for her a lifetime ago, and placed it again over her head. He frowned slightly when his hands brushed her bare neck. "You've cut off your hair."

Her eyes glowed as she brushed the cropped white tresses out of her eyes. In his last memories of her, her hair had been very long, even longer than his. Their mother had never let it be cut, and it was usually combed and styled into smooth plaits down the length of her back.

"Mother wasn't happy about that either."

Elforen stepped back and started pacing the length of the room, the frown still on his face. His elation at seeing his sister again was fading to concern. He had left home because he had failed to be the kind of son his parents wanted. Powerful druidic magic flowed in his family, but not even an inkling of it ran in his blood. Although he missed his family terribly, he was sure they were relieved to not be saddled with a failure of a son anymore. But his little sister, she had been born with the treasured golden eyes that marked a powerful druid. She had always excelled at her studies, despite her rebellious nature. Being the one girl born in the family, she was clearly their parents' favorite, and there was no way they would let her travel to the human capital, especially to visit a wayward brother.

He turned to face the petite night elf now perched at the end of his bed. His apartment was so small it was really only one room with a partition separating the sleeping area from the rest of it. He was rarely here except for sleeping, and it fit his needs perfectly. It was also cheap enough he could save up most of his earnings for travel, his true passion. He crossed his arms and leaned back against the far wall.

"Why are you here, Sister?" He held one hand up as she started to deliver a sharp retort. "Don't get me wrong, I'm overjoyed to see you again. Out of everyone I left behind, I've missed you the most."

Her eyes softened as she listened. He strode forward and took her hand in his. Although she was clearly older than when they last parted, she had not grown an inch, still small and to the unknowing, she might appear delicate. He knew from experience that inside her slight frame, coiled a fierce spirit, both mischievous and brave, and she had the druid magic to back it up. He had been the victim of both her temper and her pranks before, and neither were to be trifled with.

"You know that they will never accept you following me over here." There was no need to explain who "they" were. "You are a very talented druid. Please don't throw your potential away just because you missed me."

I'm not worth it, echoed as loudly through his head as if he had spoken it. With a disgusted look on her face, Lorel dropped his hand and hopped down from the footboard. It was her turn to pace the short length of the room now. "Oh come on Talrend, you know I've always chafed under their control. Just because I was born a druid, doesn't mean I want them to run my life!"

She turned her golden eyes to him, and he was taken aback at their intensity. "And I was so angry at how they treated you, Brother...you tried so hard, you wanted nothing more than to please them. But it was never good enough. When you left...it's like you didn't exist anymore. Oh, they didn't flat out deny your existence, if someone asked after you, it was always a vague excuse. You were away training. You were traveling. But within the immediate family, you might as well have died."

Elforen tried not to let his parents' apathy bother him. It was only what he expected, after all.

"But as much as it hurt to see them cut you out, at least it was peaceful on both sides...you didn't see how they treated Kalibose. "

Elforen's stance immediately straightened, and a twinge of fear began in his stomach at the mention of his youngest sibling. "What about Kalibose?"

Lorel's wide golden eyes were solemn as she answered. "He was secretly addicted to the Arcane."

His mouth was too dry to speak more than a whisper. "No...not Kalibose..."

Lorel nodded. "All along he pretended to study for the priesthood, when really he was learning arcane magic on the side. When Mother and Father found out, it was horrible. I've never seen them so angry. They drug Kalibose in front of the entire family, and humiliated him in front of everyone. He was banished from all kal'dorei lands, on punishment of death. They placed a mark of the exile on his forehead."

Elforen stuttered, he was so livid. "But he was just a boy! He wasn't near old enough to take the trials of adulthood: he'll never survive in the wilderness all by himself! By Elune, he was probably just dabbling, just for a lark. He needed rehabilitation, therapy, not banishment! And to try him as an adult..."

Elforen's eyes squeezed shut as he remembered his younger brother. Kalibose was one of the only ones in his extended family without the tell-tale thick white hair: his was bright blue, and he kept it in a ponytail or braid down his back. The last time he had seen him he was still in the full blossom of youth: an intelligent and thoughtful boy that could be found fishing in the stream when not busy with his lessons. Although still not the druid favored by their parents, he did have some talent at healing, and priests were well-revered among the kal'dorei. Elforen would never have thought he would incur his parents' displeasure...and to have been experimenting in the arcane...Elforen slumped down against the wall across from his bed.

Lorel continued talking. "After that, I was done with being Mother and Father's golden child. They have Terral and Alfric," she said their older brothers' names with a sneer. "They weren't going to have me anymore. I studied harder than ever, and I passed my trials a full year early."

The druid sat back down on his bed as she continued her tale.

"Mother was ecstatic. I guess she was already planning a party in my honor. She didn't know I was already packed. I cut my hair on the way to the testing grounds that morning."

The druid put a hand to her unruly, chopped hair. "I used a dagger. It looks awful. But I know how much Mother preened over my hair, and all of a sudden I just couldn't stand the sight of it." The night elf grinned wildly. "I felt so free without my hair: it was like there was nothing that could hold me down anymore. I left as soon as I came home and changed clothes. Mother tried to talk me out of it; I didn't hear any of it. I never even saw Father. I was out of port before they caught up to me."

"If they even tried to catch up to me," she added under her breath.

Elforen's mind was still reeling over the news of his brother. He, Lorel, and Kalibose had always been very close. Terral and Alfric, both esteemed druids, were much older than they were, and were often gone with the Cenarian Circle. Elforen had found himself in the position of oldest brother, and made it his duty to watch over his younger siblings. There were many cousins in the extended Woodstalker family, but they were mostly druids, with a few studying to be priests. He had been the only one lacking talent in both, instead finding solace working with his hands in the lone blacksmith shop outside of town, and practicing with the weapons out behind it. The stocky dwarf that ran the shop took pity on the night elf, and taught him all he knew, until Elforen had surpassed him in skill. He had tried to show his parents what he had learned, the weapons and trinkets he had fashioned in the blistering forge, but they passed their eyes over it to instead focus on his other siblings. By the time he was considering leaving, the other members of his family had been shunning him as well. Lorel and Kalibose were the only ones who would be seen with him. Before he left, he had crafted them each a pendant out of a bit of leftover steel, in hopes they would remember him and how much he cared for them. Lorel's was a paw print, as she was showing great talent as a feral druid, and Kalibose's had been a book. He frowned slightly. His younger brother had been slightly distant at his leaving. Had the gleam in his eyes been sadness, or had he already started to explore the forbidden magic?

"So what do you do here in the human capital?" Lorel's curiosity interrupted his memories. She had hopped off the bed and was exploring his small apartment. "It was hard to find you, no one I asked had heard of you." She poked her nose in a cabinet above the washbasin and her voice came out muffled. "I finally had to cat around, and find you by your scent."

Elforen stood and followed her around the corner. He leaned against the partition as he spoke.

"I don't go by Talrend here. I left my name behind when I joined the army."

She bumped her head as she withdrew it from the cabinet. "How was I supposed to find you that way?"

Elforen snorted. "You weren't. That's the point. I was starting over."

Lorel leaned against the counter, echoing his stance. "Well what is it? If I'm going to be here, I need to know how to find you."

"It's Elforen."

"It's WHAT?" Lorel's eyes gleamed as she started to laugh. He straightened up defensively.

"Look, all the commanders just called me "Elf" anyway, so I took it and made it my own." He looked at her sternly. "If you're going to make fun of me, then you can find your way back to Teldrassil."

His sister bit her lip against her giggling. "Okay, Elforen." When his expression did not change, she threw her hands up in exasperation. "Okay, okay. I'm sorry. I'll try to remember."

He sighed and turned to the wardrobe, taking out several blankets. "I hate to be a stick in the mud, but I've got a big journey I'm starting on tomorrow, and I need to get packed and ready. I'll take you over to the Park in the morning and acquaint you with the Druid trainers." He brought the blankets over to the chair and small hearth in the living area. He caught a glance at her wary expression. "Don't worry, they are kal'dorei, but are mostly independent. You won't have to worry about them reporting to Mother and Father." He chuckled to himself as he started a fire. "In fact they are pretty eccentric: you'll probably run circles around them."

"Just like home then," Lorel grinned as she settled in the chair. She snagged one of the thin blankets and wrapped it around her like a cocoon. "So what is this big adventure you are starting on tomorrow?"

Elforen sat back on his heels, enjoying the warmth, and more than that the companionship, and began his tale.


	5. Dragons

The wind off the ocean blew Zarabethe's dark violet hair back from her face. It washed the smell of the city off of her body, and she breathed in its fresh scent as she listened to Elforen talk. The other night elf was leaning back against the railing she had her elbows propped on, his back to the wind and his eyes off in the distance. Zar was laying at her feet crammed up against the side as close as possible. He did not enjoy boat rides.

The passenger boat the two night elves had booked passage on looked large and lumbering in port, but as they picked up speed and headed out into the open ocean, seemed to travel effortless against the green-grey water. They were leaving much later than they had planned, and the great orb of the sun was nearly touching the water as they left the Eastern Kingdoms behind. The view more than made up for the lateness of the hour, though, and they seemed to be flying along with the wind behind them.

When Zarabethe had gotten a scribbled note from the innkeeper from Elforen, telling her he would meet her at 6pm instead of noon with no explanation, she had been more than a little irritated. She had not gotten much rest the night before: the hot tea had done little to calm her belly and nothing seemed to block out the noises from the human capital. She had already purchased her supplies and packed, so to shake off her bad mood she had taken all the towels and blankets she could find, piled them over her head, and finally eased into a 3 hour respite from her mind. After climbing groggily out of her nest, she had headed out to the harbour early. It was just as busy as the city, but there was more air there, and she had found a quiet spot to hide out and wait. The solitude did much for her patience, and when Elforen had rushed into the harbour at several minutes past the hour, she was much more receptive to his hasty apology. After they had purchased passage to their home continent of Kalimdor, the two had settled into what was to be their residence for the next week, stashing their gear and finding a quiet place to watch the waves pass by.

Elforen had seemed a bit off, quiet and withdrawn. His odd behaviour had whetted her curiosity, and she had prodded a few questions at him. She had been surprised to find he opened up to her with little resistance, spilling the story of not only the previous evening's events, but rest of his life too. Personal histories, as opposed to the grand ones of civilization, had always made her feel a little awkward and she often drifted to her own thoughts in her head. But this time she had held onto his every word. He spoke freely, and words tumbled out of his mouth as if he had been holding them back a long time, and now the dam was loosened. She listened to his pain of not fitting in with his family, of his desire to protect the ones he loved, and the bitter loneliness when he was shoved aside. All of this he relayed with his back against the ocean, staring back only the way they had come. He didn't meet her eyes, as if he was a little embarrassed at his outpouring of emotion, but he continued on nonetheless.

Zarabethe held her inquiring tongue, and let him talk without interruption until he reached the part where he had taken his headstrong sister to the Park and enrolled her in training. She felt an uncomfortable twinge in her stomach. Elforen had been away from home for over fifty years, from the family he loved more than anything. Yet when one of them showed up and threw in her lot with him, instead of staying there and catching up on old times, he still kept his word and was traveling with her. The twinge turned into something more like guilt. She had found herself resenting his presence just this day, and her impatience at his delay seemed very self-centered now that she knew the cause. She looked over at the other night elf, feeling a warmth start in her heart. She cleared her throat and tried to keep her voice light, looking back at the fading sunset as she spoke.

"So why are you here then, instead of with her? You sound as if you missed her very much."

Elforen sighed and turned against the railing of the ship, for the first time leaning forward into the wind and letting it blow his long hair behind him. He took a moment to gather his thoughts, and his voice was quiet when he spoke. "I do miss her very much. She and I are very close. But I don't give up on plans that quickly. I try to follow through to the end. I can't always stay in the past." He shifted position, and when he glanced over at her, he was smiling. "Besides, for the first time in her life, Lorel is in charge of herself. I don't think she wants an overprotective big brother watching over her."

Zarabethe answered his smile with one of her own. The look on his face was more peaceful than earlier, and it was hard not to echo the expression. "From the way you describe her, she would run circles around you, Elf. There's no way you'd hold her down."

The other night elf chuckled and turned back towards the view of the ocean. "Exactly. It's easier this way."

They stood together in comfortable silence, watching the sun decorate the water with its colorful celebration of the day's end.

*****

The two night elves were nearly invisible as they lay motionless across the top of a rocky crag. Zar echoed their posture beside them, tucked underneath a hardy dry bush clinging to the sandstone. They had reached Tanaris that morning, and after a brief detour to hunt down the last silithid hive stubbornly entrenched in the desert, they were finally at their destination. The canyon that guarded the entrance to the Caverns of Time was a strange mish-mash of ruins, as if in ancient times past a great whirlwind had gathered pieces of each civilization and deposited them in its rocky walls. Zarabethe lifted her eyes to the sky as a dragon-shaped shadow passed over them briefly. Given the mysterious nature of the Cavern's inhabitants, that theory was not without the realm of speculation. She shifted closer to the edge and peered down below at their goal. They had bypassed the entrance and its lesser dragonkin guards and scaled up the shortest height along the southwest corner. There were three larger drakes milling about inside the ruins, and in the eastern corner near a dark opening in the mountain, lay Anachronos. From their vantage point, they would still have to sneak past one of the drakes to get to the great bronze dragon. She hadn't figured out yet how they were going to do it though. She leaned in closer to the night elf warrior studying the layout of the canyon alongside her.

"Any ideas yet?"

Elforen frowned without looking at her. "I don't like it. There are only two ways to get down from this cliff. Here-" he gestured to the left, a smoother incline dug into the wall, but closer to the drake patrol, "and here." He pointed to the right, a steeper path, more of a small landslide, that took them closer to Anachronos, but was much less solid and more likely for one of them to fall. "Neither of them are ideal. And there isn't a safe place to use the portal if it all goes bad."

The two night elves had studied the maps of the deserts of Tanaris and the Caverns of Time on the boatride across the Great Sea, and when it became obvious there was no easy escape route out of the canyon, they had purchased a one-way portal to Darnassus from a goblin mage in Gadgetzan. It was a pricey convenience, and Zarabethe didn't like the hum of magic that bled off the swirling blue-green orb tucked in a pocket of her pack, but there was no way they'd be able to fight past the three young drake guardians in the ruins, plus the dragonkin outside. Not to mention a possibly very angry elder dragon.

Zarabethe watched the young drake nearest to them with narrowed silver eyes. Although the ways of dragons were foreign to her, she was sure it was doing more than just meandering around. It seemed to be investigating a large piece of wood embedded in the sand. She realized with a start it was the hull of a ship. She shook her head at the idea of how or why a seafaring vessel was in the middle of the desert. Right now, she was more interested in the distraction it was providing to their closest adversary. She tapped the ground next to Elforen's arm, and pointed at the scene playing out below. After watching for a few minutes, he nodded in understanding: the drake's path around the boat worked in their advantage. Checking above for aerial guards, they donned their packs and prepared to descend into the canyon. As the drake's large bronze body lumbered behind the wooden hull, they sprang into action: they half-climbed, half-slid down the right hand path. Zarabethe cringed as their feet dislodged pebbles that rolled noisily to the ground. The going was treacherous, but they made it nearly to the ground before Zarabethe's boot slid sideways on loose scree and she cried out as she flung herself backwards, sliding down the rest of the way gracelessly on her backside. Elforen jumped down beside her with worried eyes, but there was a much more pressing problem than her bruised rear end: a rumbling roar greeted them as the drake turned around the edge of the boat and spied the interlopers. Elforen cursed as he offered her an arm up, and she agreed with the sentiment: their whole plan was to avoid confrontation until they reached Anachronos. They would have to now put the drake down as quickly and quietly as possible, before he raised the alarm to the other guardians.

Elforen drew his shield and a one-hand axe as the drake came barreling down towards them. Zarabethe scrambled up on a clump of boulders and set her feet, notching an arrow to her bow. Zar stood at the base of the rocks, growling at the approaching reptile. The drake reared up, and Zarabethe saw the light sparking out of its nostrils.

"Flame!" she warned as she lept away from the line of fire that scorched the ground in front of her. Elforen dodged it easily, and with a yell, put his shoulder behind his shield and rammed it into the dragon's armored side. The drake stopped flaming abruptly and roared in pain. It started to extend its massive wings, but Zarabethe was ready: she put a green-fletched arrow through the thin membranes: not enough to stop it flying if it wanted to, but enough to cause pain. She risked a quick glance across the ruins: the other drakes were so far unaware of the battle ensuing, but they wouldn't be oblivious forever. The drake roared again as Elforen's axe bit into its muscled forearm, and it pulled back to snap its jaws around the warrior. Zarabethe reacted immediately, and the dragon hollered as an arrow tore through the crest on its head. Knocking the white-haired night elf down with a swing of his massive head, the drake locked its eyes on her and started her way, anger burning in his dark bronze eyes. A trickle of fear ran through her as she leaped back up onto the cluster of rocks behind her. She notched another arrow into her bow and narrowed her silver eyes at the enraged dragon before her. At his size, there was no guarantee of her arrows doing more than superficial damage, but the eyes were always a good target. She breathed out through her nose, but before she could release, a snarl of a different kind grabbed her attention. A black shadow leaped at the drake's neck and dug his claws and teeth into its bronze hide. The dragon roared, distracted from the night elf momentarily. It shook its head, trying to dislodge the great cat from its neck. Elforen, who had been only dazed from his fall, came charging back to take advantage of Zar's distraction. Zarabethe hesitated, unable to lock down a sure target of the dragon's eye, and afraid she would hit Zar. With an angry roar, the drake reached up and clawed his own neck, flinging the black moonsabre into a boulder, where the cat crumpled to a pile of dark fur. Panic gripped her heart and Zarabethe forgot about trying to get her shot.

"Zar!" she screamed, scrabbling down off the rocks. Elforen heard her, and turned to where the cat lay still in the sand. He saw the dragon rearing back to flame again, and he knelt in front of Zar, protecting them both with his shield. It was not built to withstand dragonfire at close range, though, and he yelled as flame licked across his upper arm, reddening his lavender skin immediately. With the dragon intent on setting them on fire, Zarabethe found her shot. The drake screamed as her arrow pierced one dark-bronze eye. Instead of bringing it down, it seemed to only madden it further and for the first time, it spoke.

"Fools! Intruders! Protect the Caverns, my brothers!" His voice rumbled loud enough to cross the desert, and in horror, Zarabethe turned to see the other two drakes look up from their patrols and start their way. Her mind raced. They would never be able to defeat them all. Zar was down, Elforen injured, and she couldn't get to them to activate the portal. She turned desperately around in a circle, scraping for a plan, and spied the great elder dragon Anachronos, still laying by the entrance to the Caverns, seemingly oblivious to the uproar below. 

The satchel.

Throwing her bow over her shoulder, she ran as fast as she could towards the cave opening ahead. She heard the drakes roar behind her as they noted one of the intruders nearing their domain. She tried not to think about feeling her clothes catch fire suddenly behind her, or a set of teeth closing around her upper body. She ran for her life, and for the life of her friends. She reached the elder dragon just as she heard the ones behind her close in.

"Anachronos!" She tore the satchel off her shoulder and held it in front of her like a ward as she yelled. The giant bronze dragon blinked one whirling eye at her but seemed uninterested. She drew closer, trying to ignore claws the size of her entire body and the massive points of his teeth. She waved the satchel in front of his giant eye.

"Anachronos! I have your satchel!" The dragon's eye whirled faster, and he seemed to focus it on her. She continued. "Baristolth sent me! I want to find the Scepter!"

Anachronos lifted his giant head off the sand, and Zarabethe stumbled several steps back from the shifting ground. He turned and looked right at her, as if he was examining the artifact she held. She remembered the silithid carapaces, and she grabbed them out of her pack and threw them in front of her, holding the satchel towards him. Please, please recognize it, she begged in her mind. For one tense moment he looked at her, then the satchel, then down the canyon where the drakes were in pursuit. Then he stretched his great neck up and spoke in a voice deep enough to rattle the ground.

"Halt Brothers! They mean us no harm." The voice of the elder dragon seemed to come from the earth itself. The three drakes behind her, now close enough to turn her into char on a whim, stopped.

"I will speak with these intruders. Return to your posts." The drakes obeyed without question, taking to the air and landing at their patrol routes as if they had never been interrupted. Down below, she could see Elforen crouched beside Zar. She turned back to Anachronos and bowed hastily, dropping the satchel at his feet. "My companions are injured, I must check on them before we continue."

The dragon nodded, and she sprinted back down the sandy path. Sand sprayed as she stopped all at once. Zar was not moving as Elforen leaned over him. Zarabethe covered her mouth.

"Oh, Zar," she moaned into her hands. Elforen's face was grim as he ran his hands over the cat's ribs and back. She knelt down beside him and felt his neck: his heart was still beating weakly, and his chest still rose and fell with his breath. The warrior shook his head though as he reached an indented place in Zar's back: the crack they had both heard when he fell had been his spine snapping. Tears welled up in Zarabethe's eyes as she put her arms around Zar's head and buried her face in his black fur. Poor brave Zar, with his black on black stripes, and the dusting of grey on his nose. Strong and true until the end. Zarabethe sobbed as she stroked his big ears and his wide nose, not caring if anyone heard her. His body was still going, but she knew that it would give up soon: his wounds were fatal. She wanted to sit and hold him forever, but she knew she and Elforen were still in danger. Her heart ached as she looked up at the warrior. Elforen had rolled up what was left of the sleeve of his shirt, and was inspecting the burn on his upper arm carefully. He eyed the drakes wearily, and kept his shield within reach as he pulled his first aid kit out of his pack.

"What called them off?" he asked as he awkwardly tried to bandage his arm with one hand and his teeth.

"Anachronos did. I showed him the satchel. Here, let me help," Zarabethe took the bandages from him and carefully wound it around his upper arm, only touching the cloth. She swallowed hard as she glanced over at Zar's still form. She finished, tucking the end of the bandage in, and handed Elforen back his first aid kit. As Elforen hefted his pack and shield in preparation to head up to the bronze dragon waiting for them, Zarabethe watched the cat's breaths grow farther apart. Her heart clenched again.

"Will you help me bring him back to Darnassus?" her voice quivered as she spoke, but she didn't care. Elforen's eyes softened, and hesitantly, he put a hand on her shoulder. Her grief drowned out the crawling sensation that snaked up her back from his touch.

"Of course. Zar's a great warrior, he deserves a proper funeral. We won't leave him behind."

Zarabethe sniffed and nodded, trying to get her emotions under control. She still had to bargain with a large dragon before they could leave here safely. Together they turned and walked up the sandy incline to where Anachronos was waiting.


	6. Anachronos

Elforen rolled his shoulder and tried to ignore the searing pain in his arm as the two night elves approached the elder dragon at the opening to the Caverns. His shield was in his hand instead of on his back, ready in case there was trouble. He didn't trust dragons at all, no matter if this one had called off the others. Dragons were ancient, fickle beasts. Just because Anachronos had recognized the satchel, didn't mean they held his attention for more than a minute. He could just as easily change his mind, and devour them both in one mouthful. As Zarabethe stepped ahead of him to speak to the bronze beast, he quietly reached into the pocket of her pack and palmed the orb that was their escape route. He slipped it into his pocket. He would let her do the talking, and at the first sign of betrayal, he would grab her and pop the portal to the night elf capital. He briefly cast his eyes around the canyon, noting the position of the drakes, cringing slightly at a black shadow barely visible on the path. They'd find a way to retrieve Zar's body later. Anachronos' booming voice captured his attention as he conversed with Zarabethe.

"No one has sought the Scepter in many millenia, young night elf," The ancient dragon's voice was tired, as if this statement had been said many times. "Those that do start, quickly renege on it, and the satchel finds its way back to its guardian." The dragon sighed, shifting his massive weight on the sand. "Baristolth I believe is too old to receive its burden again. If you fail, the knowledge may be lost for all time."

Elforen's shrewd eyes caught the gleam in Zarabethe's silver ones. If there was one thing she couldn't resist, it was preserving history. He stepped up beside her, keeping one hand on his pocket.

"Can't the burden be passed to someone else? The quest doesn't have to be forgotten." Zarabethe glanced at him quickly, with narrow eyes. His question might be impertinent to the Keeper of Time, but he could smell a sales pitch when he heard one. The dragon didn't seem to be bothered by it.

"I tire of retrieving the satchel every time it is lost. The integrity of the spells binding it together are weakening." The dragon turned its giant bronze head north, roughly to the direction of the last dying silithid hive. "The Qiraji Empire has been defeated. It is time to let the memories fade to dust."

"No!" Zarabethe interjected, taking a step forward. She seemed to recover, and her tone turned more respectful. "History and its lessons should never be discarded." She drew herself upright. "I will take up the quest to complete the Scepter."

Anachronos fixed one whirling eye on the night elf. His demeanor no longer held a facade of fatigue. "Are you certain of that, young night elf? Many of your kind have been lost on this journey. It stretches across the entire reach of Azeroth. It will take all of your abilities to finish."

The elder dragon sat up straighter, and instinctively Elforen dropped back, raising his shield with his front arm and gripping his axe with his other. His shoulder burned with the movement, but he held the posture, taking a quick sidestep closer to Zarabethe. Anachronos fixed his gaze at a spot on the sand in front of him. Granules of sand trembled and slid out of the way as a small crystal of clear gold erupted out of the earth.

"This is a crystallized dragon tear." The bronze dragon's voice was reverent as it regarded the crystal. "It was shed long ago, and contains the memories of what transpired on the day the Scepter was lost." Anachronos moved his head back, leaving a wide berth around the crystal. "Before you make your decision, step forward and witness the tragedy of that day." Elforen watched the dragon's eyes gleam brightly as Zarabethe strode to the crystal, and with no hesitation, reached out to touch it. He followed her, and his entire vision erupted into white.

*****

Months later, during the hardest parts of her quest, she would look back and try to remember the vision she had been shown in the crystal, and the pure, raw emotion of the events would be all she could draw forward. She spent a great deal of time avoiding emotional situations, and the pain of the memories hit her like a punch to the stomach as the scene played out before her. She felt the weariness and terror of the Night Elf army struggling in vain to push the Qiraji swarm back behind the Scarab Wall. She felt the grim determination of the three children of the Green, Red, and Blue dragonflights as they sacrificed their freedom, allowing themselves to be trapped behind the wall with the enemy so that the gate could be sealed. She heard Fandral Staghelm, the leader of the Night Elves and Anachronos in human form argue in heated tones. Fandral himself was a terrible sight to behold: his eyes were dark wells of grief over the death of his son. She could sense the effort it took Anachronos to take the Scepter of the Shifting Sands and with Fandral, magically seal off the entrance to Ahn Qiraj, even as he knew it meant the death of the young dragons within. But the most cutting and memorable emotion of the entire vision was the painful betrayal that Anachronos himself felt as Fandral shattered the Scepter against the stones in front of the gates, and with it any hope of rescuing the children of the flights. As he gathered the three shards of the crystal that had been the magical focus at the top of the scepter, it was his tear that fell upon the bloodied sands of Silithus, encapsulating for eternity the events of that fateful day.

Zarabethe gasped for breath as she was released from the vision. She had dropped to her knees on the hot desert sand. Beside her, Elforen was blinking fiercely and looking around disoriented. She felt a fire of determination, stronger than she had felt before burn in her as she stumbled to her feet and approached the elder bronze dragon. He was watching her with what could only be described as a calculating look as she picked up the satchel and reverently bowed before him.

"Please allow me the honor of locating the three shards of the Scepter of the Shifting Sands and bringing them to you, so that the sacrifice of the dragonflights will not be forgotten."

Anachronos' eyes burned with an inner flame as he inclined his head in her direction. The satchel glowed faintly with a yellow, sickly light for a moment and heated up her hands, warm enough she nearly dropped it.

"I have enchanted the satchel one last time," he spoke in his rumbling voice. "If you should fail, the memories and the knowledge they hold will be lost."

"Nothing will turn me from my quest." Zarabethe spoke the words as an oath to the Keeper of Time. The bronze dragon's expression turned slightly bemused as he regarded her without blinking.

"We shall see, young Night Elf."

Zarabethe held her stance against his stare. Elforen stepped up beside her. She could not see the expression on his face, but Anachronos studied them each individually before continuing.

"The three shards were placed long ago with a representative from each dragonflight. I myself kept the staff. You will find details on how to find each dragon within the satchel. Good luck, and Dragonqueen watch after you."


	7. Darnassus

"These instructions are ridiculous."

Zarabethe looked up from the map of the Swamp of Sorrows she was studying and saw Elforen shake his head as he shuffled through a pile of letters. The two night elves were sprawled under a gigantic oak tree near the Temple Gardens. The contents of the satchel were spread out between them on the grass. A cool wind ruffled through the loose strands of her dark violet hair, the only indication that the rest of the continent was in full winter. Darnassus was its usual temperate paradise, sustained artificially by the dragons' blessings that grew the world tree of Teldrassil. She made a mental note to pack a warm coat when they started the journey south.

"Anachronos could not have picked worse guardians for the scepter shards," Elforen continued his rant. He scooted closer to where she was sitting and she leaned forward as he pointed to the first paper, outlined in green scrollwork. "The green guardian, Eranikus, is corrupted and trapped in the Emerald Dream. We have to talk to his shade at the bottom of this ancient troll temple, which I might add, is completely underwater now."

He slid that paper to the bottom, revealing one with red edging. "Vaelastrasz disappeared several hundred years ago while in pursuit of Nefarian, one of Deathwing's evil offspring. No has heard from him since he infiltrated Blackrock Mountain." He pulled the last letter into view, decorated in blue. "And Azuregos hides out in the most remote corner of Azshara and likes to taunt adventurers to their deaths. He's completely insane." He dropped the letters of introduction given to them by Anachronos in his lap in disgust. "Where do we even start?"

"Well, Azshara is not that far from here, technically. We'd have to take a hippogryph over the mountains of Moonglade," Elforen's face showed how much he liked that statement, "but that would reduce our travel time exponentially." She took a different map out of the pile she had been looking at, this one of the upper half of Kalimdor. She smoothed it in her lap and inspected the hooked wilderness of Azshara to the far east. She had never been there before, she'd heard that it had some interesting pre-Sundering Night Elf architecture though.

It had been several days since they had arrived exhausted, hearts aching, and in the case of Elforen, slightly burned around the edges in the idyllic Night Elf capital. She had gone right to Callipsus, the Head of the Darnassian Animal Sanctuary, an old friend that she had collected many animals for in the past. He had arranged a place for Zar to be buried. His old eyes had crinkled sadly when she told him the circumstances of his passing, and they had reminisced briefly as the three of them dug a small grave near the back of the sanctuary.

Laying Zar to rest had been hard, but Zarabethe had shed her tears in Tanaris, and she was stoic and quiet as they arranged the earth over him. Callipsus had leaned against his shovel like a walking stick when they were done, praising Zar's length of life and courageous spirit. When Elforen had joined in with him, she had felt the smile return to her face and a little of her sadness lessen. During the trek back to Darnassus afterwards, she listened to the two men talking and took a small amount of pleasure in quiet companionship. Used to her solitude, it was a rare admission that she did enjoy the company of others, as long as it was on her terms, and she felt safe in their presence. She had gotten a larger than usual dose of that so far on this quest, and it made her feel happy, in a shaky, uncertain sort of way.

She snuck a glance under her eyelashes at Elforen sitting across from her, puzzling through a thin leaf of parchment covered in symbols and markings in Draconic. Underneath the words, the translation had been written in tiny letters and he squinted at them as he stretched the arm not holding the paper and rolled his shoulder. The fabric of the new shirt he had bought to replace the burned one was bright and at odds with well-worn state of his other clothes. She knew he was not that skilled at languages, but appreciated that he was diving into the details with almost as much enthusiasm as she was. Her mind wandered for a moment, and he caught her looking at him when he reached for another paper.

"What?" he asked with a slight smirk. She refused to allow herself to blush. Instead she nodded to the sleeve of his shirt.

"You keep messing with your shoulder. Did it not heal correctly?" He had waited to see a healer for his burn until after they had settled Zar in at the sanctuary, which she had berated him for. He stretched his arm again as he answered.

"It's fine, it's just the skin feels weird there, like it's too sensitive. My shirt keeps rubbing against it and driving me crazy."

"I know how that feels," Zarabethe muttered to herself. When she saw Elforen look at her, she realized she had spoken out loud.

"That's how it feels when someone tries to touch me," she explained quickly into the maps in her lap. Her touch-aversion was not a topic she wanted to bring up right now. He looked at her thoughtfully, but did not pursue the subject.

They were both interrupted by a commotion behind them at the Temple Gates. A small group of High Priests had assembled at the entrance to the Temple of the Moon. By the look of their robes, it looked like they had gathered to do a blessing on someone. It was not a common practice, but Zarabethe remembered the ritual from when she lived in her mother's house. She and Elforen were by far not the only two enjoying the serenity of the beautiful stretch of grass that lay to the south of the biggest Temple in Teldrassil, and a small crowd gathered near the edge of the walkway to see what was going on. The gasps and mutters were distracting her, so she sighed and started packing papers back into the satchel.

"What's going on?" asked Elforen as he helped her clean up the scattered mess they had made. She shrugged as she shouldered the satchel.

"No idea, some sort of blessing ceremony." They joined the whispering crowd to get a better look. Near the steps of the Temple a small extended family was gathered. An older couple and what appeared to be many grown children were approaching the dais of the Temple. As the procession passed the crowd, Zarabethe could see a younger couple walking behind the older one. The husband had a protective arm around his wife. She had just registered the swell of her belly when she heard Elforen speak behind her.

"They are asking Elune to bless their child." His voice was strangely flat. "I remember my parents doing that with Lorel."

Zarabethe studied the faces of the couple curiously. The woman's face was radiant with her happiness, even though she must have been very uncomfortable. She was obviously very close to her time and she gripped her husband's arm tightly as he helped her up the steps. The adoration he felt for her was inscribed in the lines of the husband's face as he leaned down to whisper in her ear. Whatever he said made her smile in a reserved way, as if he had shared a secret that was known only to them. Witnessing this private exchange of their love made Zarabethe uncomfortable, and she averted her eyes to the grass growing at her feet. Beside her, Elforen crossed his arms over his chest.

"If that were my wife, there's no way I'd let her out of the house just for a ceremony," he said gruffly. Zarabethe looked up at him sharply. His mouth was set in a line as he watched procession up the steps. She felt a flicker of irritation ignite in her and she echoed his stance, crossing her arms.

"Don't you think that's a bit misogynist?" Elforen glanced down at her as if he had forgotten she was there. He gestured to the couple, who were nearly at the top of the steps.

"It's dangerous to travel when pregnant, especially that pregnant. Especially now, when that sort of thing isn't exactly common anymore. That's why everyone is whispering: this is the first baby blessing that's happened here in several hundred years."

"Just because she's pregnant, doesn't mean she's going to break." Zarabethe grumbled back at him. The family had disappeared into the temple, followed by the priests. The crowd around them was starting to break up.

"It also doesn't mean she should be gallivanting across the continent either," he retorted as they started to depart the Temple Gardens.

"So she should be stuck in their home, barefoot, cooking and doing laundry all day?" Zarabethe replied hotly. Somewhere in the back of her head she felt it would be wise to talk about something else, but she did not listen to it.

"All I'm saying is a little caution would not be lacking here." Elforen obviously heeded the voices in his head better than she did, because he changed the subject.

"So Azuregos first, by way of hippogryph flight. When do you want to get started?"

"I have to go by the stables first." Zarabethe's temper deflated as she remembered the task she still had to get through. She had already decided on the spotted sabre she had found abandoned in Northrend, but it felt awkward to replace Zar so soon.

"I'll meet you back at the inn tonight then?" Elforen's voice sounded strained, and then she remembered the stables were located at the edge of the Cenarian Enclave. The buildings surrounding the towering druid training center were where all the druids resided, including Elforen's family.

"Tonight's fine. That's the last thing I have to do, so we can leave tomorrow for Azshara."

Elforen nodded at her as he turned towards the shops in the opposite direction. "Good luck picking a pet."

Zarabethe watched his tall form for a moment before he disappeared in the crowd. She sighed and fiddled with the strap on the satchel as she made her way to the stables. Best to get it over with as soon as possible.


	8. Azuregos

Zarabethe hunched her shoulders and pulled her cloak closer around her. An icy wind sliced through the trees and liberated strands of her hair from beneath her hood. Just ahead of her, she could barely glimpse Elforen's white mane under the heavy woolen scarf he had wound completely around his head. She had teased him about it when they were departing the warmth of Teldrassil, but now she was rethinking its practicality.

It had been just about two weeks since they had landed in the nearly-abandoned Talrendis Point. They were greeted gruffly by a scruffy Tauren druid, who then returned to his cabin without so much as an inquiry to what they were doing. Winter in Azshara was dry, windy, and cold, and not many people trekked its icy shores in the thick of it. When they arrived, they were invigorated, eager to be started on this quest that had already had so many starts and stops. Now cold, tired, and frustrated with the lack of solid progress, they were disgruntled with both it and each other.

Just barely visible through the trees, a glimpse of not-quite-corporal blue scales propelled them forward. They'd tracked and lost two Shades of Azuregos already, but those had been much more wispy, not even solid enough for them to be sure it was actually a dragon they were chasing. Twice they had tracked it for hours, the second time even into the next day, only to reach a clearing and have it dissipate to the wind. The second time was near the broken down Ravencrest Monument, very close to the treacherous cliffs overlooking the tumultous Bay of Storms. It was said the Lord of the Oceans, Neptulon the Tidehunter himself, dwelt just beyond the reach of the jagged rocks that peppered the body of water and made it impossible to approach by sea.

Zarabethe paused to bend down and examine a track left in the dust. It was easily the size of both of her feet pressed together, with separated claws like a lizard. It was a promising sign: the other shades hadn't even left footprints. A frown crossed her face as she measured it against her hand. She knew that dragons could change size at will, especially the capricious blues, but it still appeared to be on the small side for an elder dragon. It was also very shallow, as if the creature that left it weighed far less than it should. Frustrated, she stood and scrubbed the mark out with her foot.

Spook, the grey spotted sabre beside her, sniffed the spot delicately. Zarabethe had been working on training the cat ever since she had rescued her from the Drakkari troll empire in Northrend. At the time, the adolescent sabre had been a wiry and fearful thing that clung to Zarabethe's legs in a sort of fierce loyalty to her rescuer. She had since grown into a muscular and confident adult, although she kept her steadfast loyalty. Spook was also a more genial cat, and had taken to Elforen immediately. In many ways she was a more practical pet than Zar with his sour moods, but Zarabethe still missed her oldest friend.

Ahead of her, the clawed footprints in the dust were even fainter than the one she had stopped to look at. That meant this one was starting to dissipate. It was another fake. Zarabethe clenched a fist in anger as she hurried faster after Elforen to tell him. They had tracked this one for three entire days with very few breaks and almost no sleep, all to be led astray again. She wasn't even that sure where they were at, although she knew they were close to Ravencrest Monument again. She could barely make out Elforen pushing through the bushes ahead of her, and she called out to him.

"Elf! It's a fake! Stop following it!" He paused, as if he could hear her shouting but not her words. She sprinted to reach him, just as they both spotted the Shade of the blue dragon cross in front of them, clear as day. He looked mostly solid, but Zarabethe could see that his feet were fading out. It disappeared behind a dense row of foliage, and Elforen drew his axe and ran after it, desperately trying to reach it before it got away.

Zarabethe got a horrible feeling in the pit of her stomach. How close were they to the cliffs? She shouted Elforen's name as she ran across the clearing, momentarily forgetting about the vacillating dragon they had been hunting. She broke through the bushes to find the ground dropped off sharply under her feet. She yelped and threw herself backwards, catching branches and keeping herself upright. Miraculously Elforen was right next to her, gripping a small tree with white knuckles.

"The bastard went right over the cliff, I saw him! He was trying to kill us," he panted. He had obviously gotten much closer to death than she had, and Zarabethe was at once shaky with relief and very angry. She reached down and pulled him to his feet, and they both backed carefully away from the sheer face of the cliff. Once they were safe on the other side of the shrubbery, Zarabethe turned on him and punched him hard in the shoulder.

"You almost got yourself killed! Don't you know better than to rush through bushes without looking?" she accused him, forgetting that she herself had done nearly the same thing. She was surprised to find tears stinging the corners of her eyes as she berated the other night elf.

"I was trying to catch that damned dragon! I don't know what you were doing, but I want to get out of this cold wasteland, and the only way to do that is to make that stupid blue lizard talk to us." Elforen retorted sharply, rubbing his shoulder. He turned and edged closer to the bushes, kicking at the undergrowth. "I lost one of my axes in the process too," he muttered as he searched.

Zarabethe was not done. Her knuckles smarted where they had connected with his pauldron, and she still felt terrified inside. "You read the same stories as I did, you know that Azuregos is famous for leading adventurers over the cliffs. Did you even use your brain at all?"

"You lead next time then, instead of dragging behind," came a muffled irritated reply from under a bush. "If you know so much about it, then why haven't we found-"

With a sharp cry he slid out of sight.

"Elforen!" she screamed, running to where he had last been. Her boots slid on the grass as she halted in front of a crumbling hole in the ground. It was dark and smelled of earth and something else, something old and very powerful. It at least appeared that he did not fall completely over the cliff, and she peered into the hole, trying to see into the blackness. She heard a faint groan from within.

"Elf! Are you okay?" she called down.

"I found my axe," came the muffled answer.

She unslung her bow and held it out in front of her as she sat down on the edge of the hole. Spook whined as she prepared to slide into the hole after Elforen. Zarabethe patted the sabre on the head reassuringly.

"Stay here and guard, Spook." She took a deep breath, and pushed off from solid ground. It was not a far drop, thankfully, and Zarabethe landed on the balls of her feet without falling. She blinked a few times, and her eyes quickly adjusted to the dark. She was in a large tunnel, well worn and smooth against the sides and top, as if something large brushed against it often. In one direction, it headed straight under the clearing they had been standing in. Instead of pitch black, a faint blue glow emanated from the back of the cave, giving it an other-worldly feel.

"Zara, look over here," called Elforen. His voice came from the other direction, nearest the opening. The cave quickly expanded and opened up into the light blue sky. He was standing near the edge, and when he saw her approach he pointed down. She cautiously looked out of the opening. It was a solid rocky wall straight down to the sandy beach below. The only way to get in or out of this cave was to fly in. She shook herself a bit as she stepped back from the edge. She had already had enough of near misses and falls.

"Can we both try not to kill ourselves anymore today?" she requested as they started down into the depths of the cavern.

"Agreed," said Elforen distractedly. He was running his hands along the wall as they went. "Whatever made this cave had incredibly strong hide. These rocks have been rubbed smooth, not cut."

They both fell into silence as they journeyed farther into the tunnel. As they walked faint sounds reached their ears: bubbling and occasionally a crackle of electricity. Punctuating it was an eerie laugh that echoed quietly. The cave had been narrowing pretty steadily as the ground sloped downward, but just ahead it opened up into a bigger room, and the floor leveled off. Zarabethe and Elforen exchanged a glance and silently drew their weapons as they crept to the opening of the cavern.

The sight that awaited them was not what Zarabethe had expected. Perhaps because all the dragons she had interacted with chose to remain in their more impressive draconic forms, it had never crossed her mind that one would choose to live in a dwelling suited for a humanoid. The cavern that opened up before them was spacious, clean, and comfortably furnished with overstuffed armchairs and fancy rugs. Covering one entire wall was a series of maps, some older than she had ever seen, depicting civilizations, territories, and several had been written all over, as if Azuregos had stood there and made notes of his discoveries. There were tables full of magical devices arranged in haphazard piles, and beakers and boilers were smoking on others. There were papers everywhere: shoved into bookshelves, crammed into desks, and even some in piles on the floor. The entire cave looked like a cross between an alchemical lab and a mad scientist's lair.

Zarabethe nudged Elforen and pointed. In the far right hand corner was a collection of enchanted mirrors hung on the wall. They appeared to show different places in Azshara, and as she watched, she saw in several of them one of the incorporeal dragons they had been chasing for two weeks. Zarabethe's stomach clenched as she watched one lead a small group of adventurers straight over a cliff in an exact parallel of earlier. A maniacal cackle came from the armchair pulled up in front of the row of mirrors. The person sitting in it appeared human, although his hair was a brilliant shade of blue, and he was wearing a set of elaborate mage robes in shades of cerulean. His eyes flashed blue periodically, and the power emanating off of him as he directed the shades around through the mirrors with subtle movements of his fingers identified him as the dragon they had been looking for.

Zarabethe glanced at Elforen and raised her eyebrows, sliding the satchel off her shoulder. He gripped his axe and nodded. She stepped forward into the main part of the cave and cleared her throat loudly. Azuregos whipped around immediately, eyes blazing, until his gaze settled on the satchel she held out before her.

"Oh bother," he said, and with a wave of his hand, all the mirrors went dark. He heaved himself out of the comfortable chair with a sigh and headed towards them. Zarabethe held her ground. He did not appear threatening, merely inconvenienced.

"You two should be quite proud of yourselves." Azuregos crossed his arms and leaned back against a table. Behind him, the mixtures and magical orbs flashed and bubbled with the movement and close contact of the magic-infused dragon. "You're the first mortals to survive making it to my humble home in quite some time."

Zarabethe tried to hide her surprise. She had expected a little more resistance than this. Nothing in this quest had gone as planned and she didn't expect it to now.

"I assume you have your oh-so-official letter of introduction from Anachronos," he continued in a slightly bored voice.

"Um, yes," Zarabethe said as she rummaged through the satchel. The contents had gotten shook up from the last time she had been into it, and she repressed the urge to re-organize the entire thing right there. She held the letter out to Azuregos, who merely glanced at it and waved it away.

"Oh you keep it. It smells of unwashed mortals anyway." He stood and clapped his hands together and gave them a look that made Zarabethe uneasy: eager and slightly unhinged. "So! You seek the scepter shard charged to the protection of the Blue Flight, correct?"

Elforen looked as if he felt as unnerved as Zarabethe did at the easy way this was progressing. He connected eyes with her for a moment before answering.

"Yes we are. Do you have it?"

Azuregos looked startled. "Of course I do not have the shard. That would be asinine. I walk amongst savages in this cursed land!"

The blue dragon stood and started pacing in front of what looked to be a set of alchemist's tools resting on a nearby countertop. "I cannot take five steps without some crazed orc or human trying to thrust a sharp stick into my hide. At any given time you could very well be speaking to my ghostly spirit!"

Zarabethe raised one long eyebrow at Elforen. Azuregos was definitely living up to his mercurial repuation. She tried to keep her voice as neutral as possible. "Where is it then?"

Azuregos turned to the counter behind him, picked up a book and started leafing through it as if he had all the time in the world. "I hid it."

He looked up at them and grinned, showing all of his teeth. "Go on, ask me where."

Out of the corner of her eye, Zarabethe saw Elforen shift his stance to grip one of his axes. She stepped forward to be the voice of diplomacy, and keep the dragon's attention off of him. As random as the dragon seemed to change moods, she wanted to keep him talking until they had all the information they needed. She smiled in what she hoped was a placating way.

"Alright, where?"

Azuregos laughed to himself as he set the book on the table and walked over to the wall of maps.

"You are going to love this story, my good night elves. See, here is the thing: as soon as Anachronos charged me with protecting the scepter shard, I knew I was in for an eternity of headache and pain."

He studied a marked-up map of Azshara thoughtfully, tracing it with one finger. "All I wanted to do was investigate these magic-rich shorelines and recover what artifacts might remain from the Sundering. Did you know there was once a thriving Highborne civilization here? This area is full of solid magical items, I can smell it!" The dragon's eyes gleamed bright blue, and for a minute looked as if he had forgotten all about them. Zarabethe cleared her throat politely.

"As I was saying, I held onto the scepter shard for a good five hundred years, and it was nothing but trouble. It attracted all kinds of attention—the wrong kind of attention. I wanted to be left alone to my studies, not babysit some would-be hero's ticket to glory!"

He turned back to them, with that slightly maniacal look painted on his face. "So...I gave it to the fish."

"The fish?!" Elforen blurted out incredulously.

"Not just any fish, mortal." Azuregos held up one finger, still grinning. "This fish was a minnow. A very special minnow."

Elforen threw his hands up. "The oceans are filled with minnows! There could be a hundred million minnows out there!"

Inwardly, Zarabethe agreed. For the first time, she started to understand that this quest was much bigger than anything she had ever undertaken before. Azuregos stabbed one finger in Elforen's direction.

"Exactly! Genius, I know...It will never be found now!" Azuregos was nearly giddy in his delight.

Zarabethe and Elforen glanced at each other. His look of frustration was a mirror to her own.

"Oh don't worry, my dear night elves," Azuregos continued, completely mistaking their expressions. "Just in case it is found, I gave the minnow some special powers." He strode back over to the rows of mirrors in the corner and with a subtle hand gesture, one of them lit up. "This minnow is really quite a terrible creature of my own creation. Sometimes when I am going to sleep I like to watch reruns of the unlucky fishermen who have run into this minnow and been devoured whole. They are always so surprised!"

Zarabethe could barely make out a flash of greyish skin, and what appeared to be a lot of sharp teeth as the dragon cackled. Beside her Elforen crossed his arms and regarded Azuregos critically.

"You're insane," he said with a slightly amused tone of voice.

"Genius is often misunderstood, mortal." He shut off the magical glass with a wave of his hand. "Now, about the scepter shard. If you really want that shard and do not want to spend the next ten thousand years searching for it, you are going to have to listen very carefully."

Zarabethe straightened up. Finally, they were going to get some useful information. Azuregos held up his hands like he was shaping a box.

"Two words: Arcanite buoy."

Zarabethe blinked. "Come again?"

He turned and started rummaging through the mismatched piles of papers and books on his desk. "You have to build an arcanite buoy and place it in the ocean. My minnow will be attracted to the magical emanations. When he gets near the buoy, BLAMO!" he threw several papers in the air as he gestured. "It will explode in a glorious pulse of arcane energy, revealing the minnow's true form."

He showed them a fistful of parchment in triumph. It appeared to be a detailed set of blueprints mostly written in another language.

"Also, you may or may not incur the wrath of Neptulon. A fifty-fifty chance I'd say."

Elforen started laughing in a mirthless way. "Ok, let me get this straight. You put the scepter shard entrusted to your flight by Anachronos on a minnow of your own making and you expect me to build an...arcanite beacon or buoy or something...to force your minnow out of hiding? And potentially incur the wrath of an elemental lord?" He shook his head. "Did I miss anything? Perhaps I am to do this without any clothes on, during a solar eclipse, on a leap year?"

Secretly, Zarabethe agreed with him. The details of this quest would only make sense to a madman. Outwardly though, she cringed. Azuregos gazed intensely in Elforen's direction. The rims of his pupils glowed blue, and it felt like the air was crackling with electricity.

"If I did not know better, I would think that you were mocking me, mortal; but yes, that is mostly correct. You may remain fully clothed, however."

Zarabethe cut in quickly before Elforen could respond. "How are we supposed to acquire an arcanite buoy?"

Azuregos stuffed the blueprints into an old folder and scribbled a note on the outside. "Take this ledger to an old acquaintance of mine in Tanaris. His name is Narain Soothfancy—terrible, terrible psychic, but an amazing engineer. He should be able to make sense of it all."

He tossed the folder their way and Zarabethe scrabbled to catch it. "No need to thank me, mortals, it's the least I could do."

He turned back to his wall of mirrors, and with a gesture turned them back on again. Azuregos leaned back in his armchair, completely absorbed by the antics on the different sized glasses. Zarabethe tucked the ledger more securely in her arms.

"Excuse me, but how are we supposed to get out of here?" There was no way to climb out of the hole Elforen had fallen through, and neither of them had thought to bring a flying mount. Azuregos waved his hand at them in a dismissive gesture, and with a gut-twisting wrench they were teleported immediately above ground. They stumbled at the sudden movement, and Zarabethe swallowed down a wave of nausea. Spook came rushing up to them, and she realized they were in the clearing near the edge of the cliff.

"Well, that didn't go as we expected," commented Elforen as he wound his wool scarf back around his head. Zarabethe sat right down in the grass and opened the ledger. The blue prints were nearly illegible, written in a form of Draconic that she was certain was a dialect particular to the Blue Flight. There were many notes and numbers and scribbled out places. It would take weeks to decipher on her own. She slammed it back shut and slid it into the satchel for safe keeping.

"I guess we're headed back to Tanaris then," she said. "How do you want to go about it?"

"Gryphon's fastest, except for a portal," the other night elf grudgingly admitted. He shaded his eyes with one gloved hand and looked south, as if he could see their destination from there. "I want to avoid Horde territory though. Let's head to Desolace, and we'll travel south from there on foot to Feralas." He pulled his cloak tighter around him against the chill wind. "At least it will be warm there."

Zarabethe adjusted her own cloak and settled the satchel tight against her as she stood. She would have time to try and do her own translating on the flight to the small human settlement on the other side of the continent. The satchel hummed with its own low-level magic and she felt eager to dive into its secrets again. Distracted already by the next leg of their journey, she followed Elforen as he started back toward Talrendis Point.


	9. Feralas

Elforen breathed out harshly as the ogre's foul breath assaulted his nostrils. His muscles strained as he held to his battle-axe, which was locked tight against the larger creature's club. He had the advantage of both skill and grace, but the ogre had the advantage of brute strength and tough hide. The night elf's boots slid backwards in the mud as the ogre growled and shoved forward. Elforen sidestepped, releasing his axe at the last moment. The ogre let out a yowl of surprise as it toppled forward. It was cut off as a lightweight throwing axe imbedded itself into its skull. Elforen bent to retrieve his battle axe and dive back into the fray.

The wandering group of marauders was small, but dangerous. They recognized the night elves as similar to the ones that lived in Dire Maul, the banished ones, the magic-users. Ogres were fascinated by magical artifacts, and collected them to achieve status among their tribes. He grunted as he took the head off of another ogre trying to grab their hastily stashed packs. They obviously thought the pair would be easy to kill and loot their arcane relics. Elforen's eyes narrowed as he pivoted on his back foot: he could sense another enemy behind him. In one motion he turned and threw a hatchet at where he approximated the ogre's head to be. The hatchet sunk into a tree in front of him as the ogre fell to his feet. A green-fletched arrow protruded from its forehead. Elforen turned to the large tree behind him and grinned. Barely visible in the lowest branch was his travel companion. Zarabethe saluted him with an arrow before notching it and aiming slightly to his right. He heard it thunk into a fleeing ogre as he surveyed the area. Five bodies on the ground. He frowned slightly as he nudged one with his boot. He thought he had counted six when they had barged into their camp. The two night elves had been fast asleep, as well as Zarabethe's silver moonsabre. Elforen had quickly gotten their attention as the other night elf silently scaled the tree behind him. Even taken by surprise, the two moved as a single deadly unit. He started a slow perimeter around their camp. Maybe Zarabethe had picked one off beyond the bushes.

A guttural scream drew his attention immediately back to the large tree. The last ogre, smaller and obviously smarter than the others, had hidden in the bushes at the base of the tree. He was retracting a fierce looking pole-arm from the hunter's perch. The blade at the end was smeared with blood. Time slowed as Elforen forced himself to breathe out, steady his rising alarm, and throw his remaining throwing axe. The ogre comically looked up in surprise at the hatchet imbedded in his forehead before toppling to the ground. He was sprinting before it even landed.

"Zara!" he called out as he reached the large tree. The female night elf was crouched down against the branch, clutching her side. Her shirt was soaked with red. Forgetting about ogres, his own safety, and even doubts in his mind about her affections, he knew he only needed to get to her. Tossing his axe down, he jumped up and grabbed at a knob in the trunk. He swung himself into the tree, his boots slipping a little as he navigated to where she was.

"Bastard got me from behind," she panted. Her eyes squeezed shut as she pressed her hand as hard as she could against the wound. He couldn't tell if she was doing any good against the blood continuing to soak her clothes. He spoke to her quietly but firmly.

"I need to get you down so I can see how badly you're hurt, " he said. He took her bow from her white knuckled grip and slung it over his shoulder. Without waiting for a response, he scooped her up in his arms and stepped directly off the branch, dropping to the ground as lightly as possible. Even though she tensed her body, she still cried out at the jarring landing. Gently he sat her down on the grass. Zarabethe fumbled at the ties of her jerkin as she spoke quietly through gritted teeth.

"I don't think it's that deep. Just a shallow cut."

Elforen's breath caught in his throat at the blood continuing to stain the night elf's shirt. He drew a small dagger from his boot. He knew that Zarabethe had a severe aversion to touch, but frankly he was more worried about blood loss than an anxiety attack.

"Lay down and hold still, I'll cut it," he said, showing her the knife. Her silver eyes showed the displeasure she felt towards that plan, but she eased herself on to her side on the grass and held her arm out of the way. She turned her head as he carefully slit her shirt and jerkin down the side seam and folded it out of the way. He cursed softly under his breath. Zarabethe half sat up, trying to see the wound in its entirety. The pole-arm had ripped a hole at least ten inches long, from right under her armpit, down her ribs, and curved to her back. She was right, it was not deep enough to have hit any organs, but the edges were ugly, and the wound was not clean. It still bled profusely, and Elforen hoped that was enough for now to keep infection at bay.

Zarabethe winced as she caught a glimpse of her back. Turning slightly, she pointed back at their packs half-hidden in the tall grass. "There are bandages in my bag. Can you bring them to me?"

Elforen quickly brought her pack to her and held it open while she dug through for her med kit. He found he had to keep himself from staring at the expanse of lavender skin exposed by her cut clothing. He instead tried to focus on the next step. "You're going to need more than bandages for that, Zara. You're going to need a healer."

To his surprise the night elf shook her head. "No, I'll stitch it. It will be fine." She pulled out a curved needle and surgeon's thread and laid it beside the pile of bandages.

"You're going to stitch your own wounds." He could not keep the sarcasm out of his voice. He watched her twist in vain, trying to see to hold a cloth to her bleeding side. He grabbed the cloth in frustration and pressed it against the gash. She bit her lip against a groan of pain. "How are you going to stitch something you can't see?" He nodded to the east. "Thalanaar is not too far. We'll stop the bleeding, then I'll go and get a healer."

"No!" Gasping in pain, she shoved his hand away from her side. Fresh blood oozed out of the cut and dripped onto the grass as she turned away from him, scooting away from him, as if he were the one that had injured her. He was dumbfounded, and more than that, he was starting to get angry. He was not a healer, and neither was she. If she bled too much, or got an infection, there would be little they could do about it out in this wilderness.

"Zarabethe, stop it! You have to hold still, you're making it worse!" He grabbed her shoulders and held her tightly. She flinched and closed her eyes.

"Let go," she said quietly, and he did immediately at her tone of voice. Her terror chilled him. He rubbed his hand over his face, and tried a different tactic, speaking gently to her. "I'm not a healer, Zara, but that needs expert care. I don't know what your problem is, but-"

"They'll touch me, okay? I don't want them to touch me," her voice was even but still hung on the verge of hysteria. "I can't let them touch me. If I can take care of it by myself at all, I'll suffer through it. I've done my own stitches before, it's not as bad as you'd think." The look on her face was resolute, although her arms trembled as she gripped the grass. It seemed the pain of her injury was warring with the panic in her mind. He closed his eyes and sighed. When he opened them again, she was watching him wearily. He held one finger up and looked at her sternly.

"If, and that is only if, we can get it clean and to stop bleeding, you still need either a healer or stitches, and you can't see to do it. You're going to have to let someone touch you." Her eyes closed again and it hurt him to see her fear. "I'm sorry, Zarabethe, but it's not worth it for you to get sick and die over. I care about you too much to let you do that."

There. He had not intended to let the words slip out, but it at least had the desired affect: she was listening to him. A hint of pink flush crept into her cheeks as she contemplated the grass in front of her, still awkwardly holding the cloth against her side. After a quiet moment, she met his eyes solemnly.

"If you help me, do you think we can clean the wound sufficiently?"

He did not see how he could help much without touching her. "Yes, it's bled enough by now it should be fairly clean. Which is why you need to see a healer right away."

"Have you ever sewn before?"

He chuckled nervously as her words sunk in. "I don't think I'm really comfortable with sewing my own shirt, let alone your skin."

Her cheeks flushed a little brighter as she spoke. "I have a small flask of whiskey in my pack. If I take a shot, and we go slowly, I think could handle you touching me a lot easier than someone I don't know."

"You can't be serious," he said. Her mouth was set in a line and her eyes were lucid. He ran a hand through his hair and shook his head.

"I might need a shot of that whiskey myself, " he muttered.

*****

"Would you hold your foot still?" Elforen's voice was sharp with nerves. He was carefully wiping the skin around the jagged cut in her side dry and getting ready to sew the edges together. The alcohol had warmed her face and dulled her senses, but she could still feel his every touch. It just made it easier to remove herself from the crawling sensations it triggered. She had been tapping her foot to keep a rhythm and focus her brain, but it felt like trying to dance through slush. She felt him smooth the edges of her skin flat and she felt his fingertips, warm and rough through the pain of her torn skin. She bit the inside of her cheek and reminded herself to breathe evenly. It took all of her willpower to not slap his hand away, to not leap up and run away, to just lay there and hold still, and choke back the screaming in her mind. You're safe. You're safe. You're safe.

"You're safe." Oops, that one was out loud. It was hard to keep her thoughts and words separated while the whiskey worked in her brain. She felt Elforen pause in readying the needle.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" He must have heard her. Had she only spoken one out loud or all of them? Her head was really getting dizzy.

"Yes, I'm fine." She was proud, her voice didn't sound slurred at all. She was very susceptible to drink, and only kept a small amount on her to clean wounds. She hated the loss of control vehemently. Venomously. Veraciously. The words ran and melted together as she floated along in the sea of her mind, and she was not prepared when the needle pierced her skin the first time. She cried out, then bit down hard on the bandage she held in her hand. She heard Elforen whisper his apology as he continued to stitch. Sting of needle, pain of touch. Physical, mental, both swirled around and wrapped around her brain as she floundered for a grasp of control. She was breathing too hard, nearly panting. She forced herself to breathe slowly through her nose, her teeth still clamped down on the cloth. Her ears started to buzz, and she let go of the cloth to gasp, "How close?"

"Over halfway." Elforen's voice sounded strained.

"Everything alright?" she asked, then snorted in spite of herself. She was the one being sewn up.

"Oh sure, performing surgery is my favorite mid-morning task," he said drily. The alcohol made her want to laugh, and she almost couldn't stop herself. She instead bit back down on the cloth and let her mind sway with disorientation. She tried hard to cling to something solid in her mind, something ever-present. The satchel and the Scepter? She expected her mind to soothe immediately at the thought of the quest, as it often did...but everything was too jumbled, and she couldn't concentrate on it for long.

She opened her eyes and saw that Spook had parked herself right by her head. The great cat was staring over her shoulder, she assumed watching Elforen like a hawk as he tended to her master. Zarabethe moved her head slightly to bury her face in Spook's grey-striped fur. It was comforting, and it allowed the night elf to drift farther from her body. The needle still stung, but it was almost like it was happening to someone else. She felt warmth, a calloused hand on the small of her back, steadying the last few stitches. To her astonishment, she was able to concentrate on the pressure of his touch without getting unnerved. It was like she had left her anxiety back down with her body, and up here, floating in her mind, she was far away from it. She wondered briefly if this was what it was like to be normal. All too soon, she heard the snip of the scissors, his hands were gone, and he was speaking to her. She tried to dig through the fog to listen.

"It's not very pretty, but it will hold." Elforen's voice took on a lecturing tone. "We're heading straight to the Feathermoon Stronghold from here, and we're staying until you're healed. No arguing."

She heard him digging in their packs, and tried her hardest to bring her focus down to earth. She rubbed her eyes with one hand and shoved her bangs out of her face. Carefully she pushed herself up to sitting. Her skin pulled uncomfortably, and the wound still throbbed, but everything was still functional. Her stomach, however, had about had enough with the blood loss and the alcohol. It lurched and for a minute Zarabethe was terrified she was going to vomit all over herself. Only her pride managed to swallow it down. She took a few steadying breaths. Elforen squatted down beside her and watched her warily. When he seemed satisfied she wasn't going to fall over, he set a bundle of muslin beside her.

"Here's one of my shirts, since we've ruined yours." Belatedly, she glanced down and clasped an arm across her stomach. Her clothes were in tatters. She'd have to purchase new ones when they stopped at Feathermoon. Her embarrassment brought the world a little more in line. She swallowed hard.

"Thank you."

Elforen stood and walked back towards the river to give her privacy to change. Zarabethe laid the shirt down in front of her and nervously loosened the ties of the one she was still wearing. With a quick glance over her shoulder, she could see the other night elf's back to her as he walked along the shore. She started to yank her shirt off over her head, and gasping in pain, stopped immediately. She could barely lift her arm. She tried to work her arm carefully out of her sleeve, and after struggling for several minutes, she dropped her other arm and braced herself against the ground as waves of pain washed over her. She swayed slightly as she scowled in frustration at Elforen's shirt laying in front of her. She was not going to ask for help. She would simply cut it off. She fumbled for the knife in her boot, and started to split the remains of her shirt down the middle. Her hand was shaking so much she nearly stuck herself in the stomach. She dropped the dagger in the grass and covered her face. She couldn't even undress herself. Angry tears stung the corners of her eyes as she fought with the dizziness in her mind. Here she was, injured, unable to care for herself, and she could barely keep her mind attached to her body where it belonged. She could not recall a time when she had felt so humiliated. As if on another planet, she heard footsteps approach behind her. They hesitated, and she heard Elforen clear his throat behind her.

"Let me help you." His voice was curiously strained, almost a whisper. She sensed that her acquiescence would be more than a simple friendly gesture: it would be an offering of trust between them both. She would allow him to touch her, and he would respect her vulnerability. She took a steadying breath, and nodded.

He picked up the dagger, and she could feel the warmth radiating off his body as he knelt behind her. Careful to only touch the fabric, he split her shirt down the middle of the back and pushed it off her shoulders. She pulled it off her arms, shivering as a breeze blew across her bare skin. Without the thin barrier between them, she felt as if her soul had been flayed open for him to read. Panic clutched her throat briefly until she felt the soft fabric of Elforen's shirt being tugged over her head to shield her again. She shut her eyes and breathed out, and willed herself not to flinch at his touch. She let him manipulate her arms through the sleeves, dressing her as one would a child. One hand gently scraped against her side as he pulled the hem down, and it burned with his touch long after he had stepped away. She was acutely aware of his quick breathing as he gently pulled her dark violet hair out of the back of the shirt. It was a tangled mess after the abrupt wakening and fight, and he took a moment to smooth it down. As his fingers threaded through the thick strands of her hair she found herself tipping her head back in response. The sensation of him running his hand through her hair awakened something in her; not fear, or even quite pleasure. It was a buried emotion struggling to rise to the surface; the closest she could place it was a yearning. She heard him swallow hard, and he brought his other hand up to brush her hair back from her face. He lingered there far longer than was necessary, combing her hair with his fingers, both of them afraid to speak. Abruptly, he cleared his throat, and dropping his hands, stood and walked away quickly, as if he realized what he had been doing.

The rawness of Zarabethe's emotions surprised her as his hands left her hair. It was hard to breathe, and for once she didn't try to stiffen up and push it away. She clung to the feeling in her chest as it pulled her down. Although her dignity berated her in her head, being tended to by one she considered safe was an unexpected warm blanket when she hadn't realized she was freezing. Spook, perhaps sensing her master's vulnerability, nosed her gently in the shoulder. Zarabethe wrapped her arms around the spotted cat and laid her head wearily in her fur. Exhaustion was building up inside of her, and she knew she was going to lose to the maelstrom of alcohol, injury, and overwhelming emotions soon. She wanted to lay down and sleep for days.

Vaguely she listened to Elforen shuffle around the camp as she rested her head. When he returned to her, she was nearly snoozing. She started slightly when he began to speak.

"I'm sorry, Zara, but we have to make some distance. We're not safe here." The night elf ran a hand through his thick white hair as he glanced around the clearing. "There are likely other ogre packs around, and with you down, we can't take any chances."

The thinking, survivalist part of her brain rose to the surface, and despite her weak body, she nodded and tried to prepare herself to move. She scrubbed one hand across her face roughly, feeling her senses start to return. The effects of the alcohol were finally abating, and she felt slightly more in control of her emotions as she braced her hands on Spook's back and pushed herself to standing. The world wavered a bit, but she forced it back into focus. So far so good. Keeping one hand on Spook's head, she took a few stiff steps forward. By the time Elforen had joined her, she was walking almost smoothly. He was heavily laden with both packs, the satchel, and all of their combined weapons. Zarabethe felt a sudden fierce stab of jealousy, and wanted to snatch the satchel off his shoulder and put it over her own head. She shook her head at the surprising reaction, and instead made herself reach for her bow and quiver. When the other night elf shook his head, she pushed down a flare of annoyance.

"I can't go unarmed. I can still draw my bow. And even if I couldn't, anyone watching would see you carrying all the gear and recognize me as an easy target."

His reluctance was clear as he handed it over, but even though it pulled painfully against her side, she felt much better with her weapons within easy reach. She straightened her shoulders and gathered herself around her iron will as they started off down the path to Feathermoon. She knew it would be painful, but she was determined not to let it slow her down. The faster she healed and got back to normal, the faster she could have her gear back. And the satchel would be in her possession again.


	10. Feathermoon

It was nearing moonrise of the second night by the time the two night elves approached the crest of the ridge that separated the wilds proper from the flatland that stretched along the length of the coast. Zarabethe grabbed onto the branch of a scraggly bush and pulled herself up beside Elforen, who was gazing intently across the sea. Barely visible in the darkening atmosphere was the kal'dorei stronghold of Feathermoon. It was just a dark smudge against the horizon in the fading light. Zarabethe's heart sank as she leaned wearily against a determined tree that clung to the top of the hill. The last two days had been utter agony, and she was almost at the end of her strength. In her single-minded focus on simply putting one foot in front of another, she had completely forgotten that for added security, Feathermoon Stronghold was actually located on an island off the coast. Zarabethe bit down hard on the inside of her cheek, already ragged and bloody from several of the same motion. She made herself stand up straighter, squaring her shoulders, and pushing off from the tree. The fire that ran down her back at her movement made her draw in her breath, but when the other night elf turned her way in concern, her countenance was arranged in simple determination. Relaxed would have been better, but keeping pain off her face was difficult enough.

She refused to admit it to herself, but her injury had become more and more painful as their journey continued. She could feel the flame of infection starting at the edges of her torn skin, turning red against the pale lavender of her back. Weakness was not an option though. From the corner of her silver eyes, she could see the satchel slung over Elforen's wide back. Even from here, through her near delirium, she could sense a faint hum of magic from its contents. She narrowed her eyes at it. She wanted it back. Elforen had refused to let her carry anything but the barest weapons for her protection, citing her need to heal. Therefore she showed as much strength as possible: pushing through vegetation with no hesitation, putting an arrow directly through the eye socket of a rabbit for their supper. (Elforen had not seen the rabbit she had missed completely due to her shaking hands). She ate heartily under his approving eye, although her stomach turned uneasily, and she ended up losing it later deep in the underbrush. Despite their tense moment in the ambushed campground, or maybe because of it, he kept his distance from her, although his thoughtful eyes never left her.

Spook bumped her head into her hip, and she reached down and scratched behind her great grey ears. The spotted cat was not fooled. She stayed glued to the night elf's side as they had worked their way through the jungles of Feralas. Zarabethe found herself leaning against her steady companion more often the longer they traveled. It was either that or stop completely and rest, and she had avoided calling for a halt the entire time. She grimly stared at the dock just visible at the shoreline, and knew she had to keep moving if she was going to complete this ruse. Her legs threatened to give out against her will to stop them trembling, and no amount of locking them into place was helping.

"On we go then," she said, gruffer than she meant to. She started down the narrow path that led to the small building by the shore that marked the dock. It was barely more than a shack that listed to the side under the wind, but it was the only passage into Feathermoon without a portal or a military escort. She heard Elforen follow behind her, but she did not risk a glance backwards, and focused instead on the bare earth that was the only indication of a path.

*****

Elforen kept a careful eye on Zarabethe as she maneuvered down the path in front of him. He could see the exhaustion in the set of her shoulders, and the listless way she picked out her footing. She refused to acknowledge it, and kept her head held high and her eyes wide and focused. He shook his head at her determination. It was unthinkable that two days before she had needed his help to remove a shirt. He took a bad step, sliding a bit before he caught himself. Up ahead, Zarabethe had paused at the bottom of the path. She made it look like she was scouting ahead, but he saw her lean against Spook to keep her balance. She was still wearing his shirt, and it was big enough on her that even though the straps of her quiver and belt were snug against her body, the folds of the shirt billowed around in the wind. The disparity between their body types was not something he had really dwelled on before, but since the other day...he couldn't get it out of his head. He had tried to be respectful, professional even, pretend he was just helping a fellow soldier with an injury. But to see Zarabethe with her walls completely down, in such a vulnerable state...he hadn't been able to keep his mind in quite the right place. And the way she had reacted when he touched her hair...so at odds with her usual aversion to touch. He'd had to get up and leave quickly before he had done something foolish. The thought of it made him feel uncomfortable in his own skin. He was sure just the fact that she didn't allow anyone to touch her made her seem like forbidden fruit, and it didn't help that she had eased the loneliness in his heart the last few weeks. But her taking down the wall of independence, her actually needing him, was his undoing.

Ahead of him, Zarabethe was waiting for him with her eyebrows raised, clearly irritated at him taking his time down the path. He realized he had stopped walking altogether, gazing off in her direction. He hefted the bags on his back and quickly covered the distance between them. As he got closer he saw her sway a bit in place before grabbing Spook and starting across the rocky beach. He frowned and jogged to catch up, meeting up with her just she reached the small dock. It was nearly twilight, and the waves lapping against the shore were grey and moving inward. She was staring at the island in the distance with a weary look on her face. Up close, he could see how her injury was taking its toll on her body. Her hands trembled even though she clenched them into fists. Her eyes burned with an unnatural intensity, which he suddenly realized was fever.

"Zara, are you okay?" he asked, concerned. He wondered if she would punch him if he felt her forehead.

She turned her bright eyes to him and tried to hold herself taller and straighter. "Sure," she said, her voice curt and breathy. He tried not to roll his eyes as he loaded the packs and satchel into the boat moored at the dock. He turned back to her just as she lost her battle with the weakness. Her face turned pale and she swayed again. He caught her as she stumbled forward, and he gasped at the heat radiating off her back. Without bothering to ask, he yanked the back of her shirt up and saw the skin around her wound red and inflamed. She pushed weakly against his arms and shook her head.

"No, it's fine Elf, I can keep going." He ignored her and scooped her up in his arms. She pushed against his chest a little harder. "Put me down."

"Like hell I will," he said as he carried her to the boat. He laid her down against the packs and she stopped struggling. Grabbing the oars, he pushed off from the dock in one frustrated movement. "Why didn't you tell me it was infected? Do you want to be miserable? You are going right to the healer when we get to Feathermoon, no arguing."

Zarabethe did not answer, she just stared blankly at the water as she sat in the boat, leaning against the packs and half on her side. Spook lay at her feet. Elforen's frown deepened at her silence. If she wasn't going to argue, she really must feel sick.

They passed most of the journey with only the sounds of the waves hitting the boat and the oars slapping against the water. Elforen had long given up on conversation and was just focusing on making it to the other shoreline when he heard her speak.

"I'm sorry."

Elforen nearly dropped the oar. He looked back at the other night elf. She had her arms wrapped around herself and she was still staring at the dark grey water. As he watched, she shivered against the breeze and hunched over further. He sighed. They were almost to Feathermoon Stronghold, but he drug the oar, slowing the boat's progress. He unhooked his cloak and draped it around her as she looked up at him with glassy eyes. He sat down across from her, close enough that his knees pressed into Spook's side. The grey spotted cat grumbled and scooted over as much was possible in the small boat. Zarabethe looked confused as she took in their surroundings: the approaching shoreline, their vessel all but stopped in the water. She sat up, still shivering despite being wrapped in his cloak.

"Why have we stopped?"

"Because I want to settle this before we get to shore." Elforen leaned forward on his knees and regarded the other night elf

Zarabethe narrowed her eyes. Some of the delirium left her gaze and she seemed to draw her focus around herself. "Settle what?"

Elforen leaned back and spread his arms. "I am not your enemy. Despite what you think, I only have your best interests in mind. I know you're still upset about Zar, but we've done nothing but argue since Darnassus. If we're going to go on this quest together, we have to be on the same page. Otherwise we're just endangering ourselves."

Zarabethe had closed her eyes at the mention of Zar's name. She took a deep breath, and looked off into the water as she spoke.

"I know I am difficult to travel with. I'm not used to being around other people. I guess this quest just feels so important, and no one else is giving it a chance. I NEED to complete it."

Elforen reached up and brushed her messy violet braids back from her face. She had not bothered to do anything with her hair since they had been ambushed. He suspected she would not admit it was too painful to fix her own hair. She did not pull away, and he was careful to not touch her skin. When she finally looked at him, her eyes were pained but not as guarded as they usually were.

"I am sorry. I can't just turn off what I've lived centuries with. But I would like you to stay, if I haven't scared you away already." She laughed quietly. "It takes a lot to admit that I need help, but I couldn't have gotten this far without you."

Elforen held his hand out. "Truce?" She looked at his hand like it was on fire and automatically pulled away, but seeing the expression on his face, she hesitantly reached her hand out. She took a deep breath, and grasped his hand firmly. He couldn't keep the grin off his face as they shook hands. She had voluntarily touched him. It was progress. He grabbed the oar and started moving them forward again.


	11. Lunar Festival

A small group of Sentinels met them at the dock as the skiff pulled up to the shore. Elforen looped a rope over a post and pulled the boat up on the sand as the captain stepped forward to greet them. Zarabethe watched him exchange formalities through a feverish haze. She couldn't quite hear what they were saying, but at some point she knew they were talking about her, because he pointed, and the Sentinel turned and nodded her head. Zarabethe tried to keep a scowl off her face. She knew she was in the wrong: she was injured and sick beyond anything she could heal by herself. She'd be lucky to be able to even climb out of this boat. But for as much as she had swallowed her pride on the boat ride here, it was rising back up in her and was hard to shake off. Appearing weak to Elforen was hard, but permissible: appearing weak to a unit of night elf elite soldiers was unforgivable. She saw him walking back toward the boat, and gathering her strength, pulled herself to standing. Her head spun, and her back burned, but she made it onto dry land without falling. Spook, the ever-vigilant, was right behind her. Elforen offered her his arm, but she clenched her jaw and continued walking under her own power.

Two of the Sentinels escorted them to the open air fortress in the center of the island. As they passed small clusters of civilian housing, she could see people hanging lanterns and decorating the front of the the archways with small coins and ribbons. She wracked her brain. Was it possible it was already Lunar Festival? How had she lost the time so quickly? Her heart ached briefly in regret. The night elf new year was her favorite time of the year. Unless she was away at war, she always tried to make it back to the capital city to celebrate and consult with the ancestors. Sneaking into the highest branches of the trees to watch the fireworks out of Astranaar was one of the fondest memories she had of her childhood. That, and helping her mother bake the cakes for the celebrations at midnight. The realization that she was forever away from Teldrassil, or even quiet Ashenvale Forest, on this of all occasions, unsettled her. It sucked the anger away from her, leaving her with less determination than before. When they reached the steps to the infirmary in the middle of the small village surrounding the fortress, she paused. The steps waved back and forth like she was viewing them through water. She closed her eyes for a moment, hoping to gain her control back, but she lost all her bearings, and she felt a hand on her arm as she tilted backwards. The touch jolted her eyes open, and she grabbed the rail of the stair and forced herself to look upwards at her goal. The steps would not stay still long enough for her to count them. Her knees shook, and although she knew she would regret it, she sat down on the bottom step to try and regain her stability. The hand left her arm, and Elforen squatted down in front of her, his arms resting on his knees.

"No backing out now," he scolded lightly. She almost shook her head, then decided it would be a bad idea. By Elune she had never felt this sick before.

"I..." she swallowed. "I don't think I'm going to make it up the stairs."

Some of the amusement left Elforen's face, and he opened his mouth to respond, but he was interrupted by quick footsteps behind her. Zarabethe turned her head to see two young blue haired priests hurrying towards them. She blinked, and they coalesced into one as she reached them. The priest looked like she was in a complete tizzy, wringing her hands and muttering.

"Oh dear, oh goodness, I'm only supposed to be watching the infirmary for the evening, why isn't Meranick back yet?" The priest leaned forward to put her hand on Zarabethe's forehead, and she pulled back, but not far enough: she felt the night elf's cool delicate fingers on her face, her cheeks, and the sides of her neck. The soft touch was worse than any pain in her back. She scrabbled backwards awkwardly to escape the priest's ministrations. The priest smiled sympathetically.

"It's okay, I'm not going to hurt you," she said in an overly patient voice. "I'm here to make you feel better."

Zarabethe didn't bother to keep the disdain off her face as she growled at the priest, who was wavering again into two night elves with equal irritatingly pleasant expressions.

"I am not a child! Just quit touching me!" She grabbed the railing and pulled herself up to standing. She took one stumbling step away before running into Elforen. She put one shaking finger in his resolute face.

"No. Absolutely not. I will just go drink myself into oblivion and wait it out.". Even though his face moved in and out of focus, his expression was clear. He reached down, and in one dizzying movement, she found herself thrown over his shoulder and heading up the stairs to the infirmary. She slapped one hand against his back weakly.

"Put me down, you great, insufferable, oaf!" Anger was bringing her focus back, but siphoning her energy. She struggled to hold her head up as they ascended the stairs.

The priest followed behind with a confused look on her face. "Now don't be ridiculous. How can I heal you without touching you?"

"Elf, please..." she begged as they turned into a curtained area off of the main room of the infirmary. He set her down on the cushioned table in the middle of it, and held her hands when she tried to wriggle off of it.

"Stop it. You know you're sick. You know you need a healer. Just let the woman do her job, okay?"

Zarabethe closed her eyes and took a shaky breath. Panic was rising up above the dizziness in her head, and she tried to keep it down. She needed an anchor. She turned her hands over and threaded her fingers through Elforen's gloved ones. She opened her eyes and tried to focus on him.

"Stay with me then?"

The look on his face was unreadable as he squeezed her hands. "Yes, of course. I'll stay right here."

Even if the scouring of the infection hadn't been excruciating, holding herself still while a stranger removed her shirt and touched her bare skin was near impossible. Hot tears ran down her cheeks as she pressed her face against the table and tried not to scream. Elforen stayed true to his word, and never let go of her trembling hands. By the time the priest was done removing the infection and healing the wound over and was covering the new pink skin with gauze, she was exhausted and lay limp on the table.

"Here you are," said the priest brightly as she draped a thin blanket over Zarabethe's back. She had kept a steady chatter about everything from Lunar Festival to local gossip going through the entire process, but both of them had ignored her. She patted Zarabethe's forearm and she flinched. The priest didn't seem to notice. "When Meranick returns he'll give you something to help you sleep. You should be good as new by tomorrow afternoon." She turned and pointed a finger at Elforen, who looked like he was tiring of her as well. "Now make sure she stays in bed tonight. No running off to enjoy the festival."

Zarabethe waited until the curtain swung close behind the night elf before reaching down to scratch Spook's head under the table.

"Eat her, Spook."

Elforen chuckled as he settled back against the wall. She watched him arrange their bags and try to lean against them and close his eyes.

"You can go get a room at the inn Elf, you don't have to stay with me tonight," she said, feeling a little guilty at his discomfort. He lifted one eyebrow at her.

"Are you sure? I don't mind staying, if you need me here."

"I plan on doing nothing but sleep. I've got Spook here to keep me company." She patted the spotted cat on the head.

Elforen shouldered his pack and gear, and shoved hers under the table she was laying on. He hesitated before he stepped past the curtain, and smoothed her hair with one hand.

"The inn is right next door. If you need anything, I'll be here."

Zarabethe smiled and reached her hand out. He grasped it, and she again felt warm and anchored to the world.

"Thank you," she said quietly. She wanted to tell him how important he was in keeping her sanity, or how grateful she was for his patience. But all that came out was those two words, and she wasn't sure how much of her meaning he understood as he squeezed her hand and left. With a sigh, she reached down and dug her fingers into Spook's soft fur, rested her cheek against the table, and quickly fell asleep.

*****

She was not sure if "Meranick" had stopped by in the middle of the night and and given her something to sleep or not, but for the first night since they had left Darnassus, she did not dream of the Scepter at all. She finally woke sometime after noon the next day, feeling better than she had in weeks. The new skin at the scar on her back pulled slightly when she stretched, but there was no more pain or infection. No one was around when she woke, so she was able to dress quickly with no discomfort. She eyed Elforen's shirt as she tucked the extra folds of the cloth under the straps of her belt and quiver straps. It was comfortable and well-worn, but she was sure she looked ridiculous in it, and he was probably wanting it back. The first thing she would do is go purchase new clothes.

She donned her pack and gear and frowned slightly as she realized he had kept the satchel with him. She shook it off quickly though: it made more sense to keep it with him, in a room that could be locked, rather than in an open room in an infirmary. In fact, the intense desire she had before to reclaim it was starting to fade. Everything about her spirits was light as she and Spook departed the medical building and she breathed in the slightly cool air that hung heavy with the smells of the festival. There were more vendors set up in town that would normally be there, and she had no problem finding one to purchase two sets of clothing from. After the last week, she figured it would be prudent to have an extra. She was admiring a beautiful piece of dark green silk when Elforen caught up to her. She gave him a bright smile as he approached, which seemed to take him aback at first.

"Well, you look like you're feeling better," he mused thoughtfully. He was holding a traditional Lunar festival cake, drenched in honey, and she suddenly realized she was starving.

"Much better. Where are the food vendors?" He laughed and led the way to a string of stalls set up along the wall of the inn. The smells radiating off of them were heavenly, and she indulged in more food than usual. They leisurely walked the paths of the festival, navigating on the edge of the crowd. Feathermoon went all out for Lunar Festival: every house and building was lavishly decorated, and the entire island was bustling with activities. Every Night Elf on the street, and a few other races as well, was dressed to the nines in vibrant hues of silk. Zarabethe felt slightly out of place in her mismatched clothes, but the excitement of the festival was impossible to be kept down for long, and it soon outweighed any anxiety gathered at the edge of her mind. She hadn't ever attended a festival with another person before, except her mother long ago, and she was truly enjoying herself. Elforen easily won a hatchet throwing contest, and she left several grumbling Sentinels in the dust at archery. One of them, who had already been dipping into the festival wine, loudly bragged of her glaive-tossing prowess, and Zarabethe good-naturedly split the prize money with her rather than be dragged into a contest with the deadly throwing weapons. A circular stage had been set up in the middle of town, where musicians were playing familiar ballads and rousing dancing tunes. Elforen surprised her by singing along in a clear baritone while she tapped the rhythm against her leg, but she declined his offer to dance.

By the time the sun had dropped low in the sky, Zarabethe had nearly forgotten about the satchel burning slowly like an ember in the dark crevices in her mind. The crowd had swelled to an alarming size in anticipation of the fireworks and other, less savory after-dark activities, and the two night elves, drunk already on their enjoyment of each other and the day's events, laughingly purchased a bottle of good dwarven wine and retreated to the edges of town to find somewhere to watch the light show. Spook had disappeared into the woods earlier to escape the throng of people, and she reappeared as they scaled a small green hill near the line of trees that marked the wilder parts of the island. The evening turned humid as the breeze died out, and the wine warmed her cheeks further as the two regaled each other with tales of festivals past, and the events of their journey so far. Alcohol made Zarabethe's tongue loose, and she found herself telling Elforen about her passion for both animals and history, and how they gave her a sense of control over her often overwhelming surroundings. Elforen shared some hilarious memories of himself and his siblings, and as Zarabethe sat there with her back pressed against a tree, holding her sides from laughter and feeling her toes tingle from the wine, she wished the night would never end.

They both grew quieter as the sky darkened and they waited for the fireworks to begin. Elforen joined her leaned up against the tree. His shoulder brushed against hers, and for once it didn't bother her. She was starting to feel sleepy from the wine and the quiet when Elforen interrupted her thoughts.

"So can I ask you a question?" His voice was different from before, and she turned her head to look at him. He was staring down at his boots with his arms crossed over his chest. His face was mostly hidden at this angle by his hair.

"Sure."

He turned to look at her, and his eyes glowed bright silver. "How come I can touch your hair with no problem, but anything else throws you into a panic attack?" He said it all at once, as if he had been sitting there contemplating the question for awhile and just now got up the nerve to ask. Zarabethe felt her cheeks blush crimson and she rubbed one hand across her eyes as she fought for a safe answer. She felt her anxiety, which had been dormant all day, start to creep back into her mind. Instead of a short answer she could hide behind, the wine drew the truth out of her mouth.

"It's not that I don't want to be touched, it's just my damned brain can't handle it. I guess my hair is neutral territory: it's not my skin, so I can enjoy it without freaking out." She met Elforen's eyes, which had turned mischievous. He reached over and tugged on the end of one of her loose braids.

"So I can do this and you won't punch me?" The sensation sent an unexpected hot spark down her spine. She bit her lip against it and leaned forward and punched him in the shoulder.

"Punching you is also neutral territory," she laughed, a little breathlessly. He laughed with her and shoved her with one hand.

"So shoving is okay too?" He did not even try a little bit to get away from her as she knocked him down with both hands. Spook got up grumpily as the warrior bumped against her and moved farther into the trees to lay down.

"Only if I'm shoving you, you big oaf."

"That's not fair," he laughed as he reached for her. She dodged, but not far enough and he grabbed her arm and pulled her to him. "You're too slow, hunter," he teased. His face was inches from her, and she could feel the heat radiating off his body. Instead of making her want to run, she found it gave her the urge to move closer still. She smiled coyly, and when he leaned toward her, drawn in by the impish light in her eyes, she nipped him on the chin playfully. He yelped, dropping her arm and rubbing his chin. She stood on her knees above him in triumph.

"And you're too trusting, warrior." Her blood sang in her veins as she gloated. She had barely registered the smoldering look in his eyes as in one movement, he sat up and grasped the back of her head with both hands and crushed his lips to hers. For one terrifying and exhilarating moment, she stopped breathing as he kissed her hard and deep, too surprised to even move. Abruptly he pulled away, realizing her frozen stance and wide eyes. He backed up awkwardly, throwing his hands up as if he expected her to start hitting him.

"Oh hell, Zara, I'm sorry, I don't know what came over me." Her mind had already blown way past that. She was not scared. She was not anxious. She WANTED this.

She interrupted his stammered apologies by grabbing the front of his shirt and pulling him toward her. She planted her mouth against his words and kissed him back, leaning into him with her entire body. She wasn't even sure what she was doing, but she knew it felt right. She heard him moan as he wrapped one arm around her waist, and brought his other hand up to cradle the back of her head. He tasted of wine, fresh air, and the rushing river. Emotion welled up inside of her and all thoughts of propriety flew out of her head. She never knew something as simple as a kiss could ignite in her something so fierce and primal. She wound her fingers through his thick white hair as he kissed her recklessly. His eagerness quickly overtook hers, and as she felt herself being pushed down in the soft grass, a feeling of claustrophobia started to overtake her desire. She started to tense up, which was what she did not want to do.

"Wait," she mumbled against his lips, trying to pull away to breathe. He backed off, inches away from her trembling lips, breathing hard and mumbling an apology in a rough voice. She sat up and took a deep breath, centering herself, willing the seed of anxiety away.

"I don't want to stop, just, not all at once, alright?" She tried to smile encouragingly as she pulled him to her again. This time, instead of kissing her, he buried his face in her hair. She tipped her head back, sighing as he undid what was left of her braids, and gently combed through the tangled violet tresses with his fingers. He did this until she was completely relaxed, leaning against his arms.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" he murmured into her hair. His breath against her scalp sent a warm tingle up her spine, and she nodded. Keeping one hand in her hair, he started kissing her again, slowly, watching her face. The exhilaration of his kiss, combined with his hands gently tugging on her hair, broke down her defenses, and very quickly they were both on the ground clinging to each other. Heat rose off of them in the humid night air, and piece by piece, clothing was tossed aside. With each article that she removed, she felt a twinge of nervousness, but his mouth and his hands were on her and it was quickly buried under the wave of the desire she was drowning in. She kissed him with a desperation, a need to draw him as close to her as possible before her mind was overcome with fear. When she felt him hesitating, then gently pulling back, she nearly cried out, grabbing at his shoulders to keep him from breaking contact. He kissed her tenderly on the forehead, but leaned away until he could look her in the eye.

"Zara, have you done this before?" he asked quietly. With a start, she realized they were both completely naked. Her anxiety began to creep back in, and it took all she had not to cover herself. She forced herself to breathe and looked away in embarrassment. Elforen mistook her look, and his voice was soft as he stroked her hair. "It's okay, I just want to make sure this is what you want."

She leaned against his hand, and took a deep breath against her rising fear. His warm hands, calloused from years of battle, again anchored her to the ground, and her anxiety slid away. Her voice trembled with emotion as she spoke. "I've never wanted anything more in my life." She chuckled nervously as he leaned into her again, kissing her neck. "I just feel so exposed."

"I can fix that." Elforen grinned as he reached back to the pile of their clothes. He pulled his shirt over her head, and she laughed at the obvious echo of several days ago. Her laughter faded quickly at how intensely his eyes blazed as they raked over her body. He laid her back down in the grass, smoothing the shirt down over her belly. She gasped as he climbed on top of her, leaning down to whisper in her ear.

"Seeing you in my shirt the last few days has been driving me wild." His voice was rough as he settled his weight against her. She tried not to tense up at the feeling of being trapped. She focused instead on his silver eyes gazing into hers, and the rest of the world fell away. He spoke, and she realized that he was trembling as well. Her heart swelled at the idea that for all his brazenness, he might be overwhelmed by emotion too.

"Are you ready?" he asked, holding himself back, asking permission one last time. She looked him full in the face, unhesitant in her answer.

"Please, Elf."

With a groan, he drove downward, and Zarabethe hissed out a breath. The pain was sharp, exquisite, and thankfully brief. Before she could formulate any doubt in her head, he began to move against her, and every thought flew out of her head except breathing, grasping hands, a delicious pressure, and his silver eyes burning into hers. She built to a crescendo of passion she had never felt before, crying out into the night sky as his grip tightened on her, his cry echoing hers.

He held her to him afterward, absently smoothing her damp hair off her forehead as they lay quietly together, listening to their hearts slow their pounding and breathing in the still night air. Zarabethe was dozing when she felt Elforen shift position and lean back to watch the night sky.

"I'm sorry Zarabethe," she heard him whisper. She woke fully, startled, and peered into his face. He looked at her with a gleam in his eyes as he gestured toward the town below them. "I'm afraid we missed the fireworks show." He chuckled at the consternation on her face, and she shoved him over as she settled back down to sleep. She heard him shift in the grass beside her, still laughing quietly to himself as the night overtook her.

*****

"What have we got here, hmm?"

The feminine voice drifted down to him through the veil of deep sleep. Elforen tried to ignore it: he was still wrapped in an exhausted euphoria that he had no intention of leaving.

"What do you think Nevali? An eight? Maybe a nine?" Another voice joined the second. By Elune, quit talking. Couldn't they see he was asleep?

"I don't know, Ellah. He does have very long ears. You know what they say, the bigger the ears..." The first voice dissolved into giggles at the same time Elforen felt something run along the length of one ear. He swatted at it and shifted position, feeling the long grass tickle his thighs. He jumped up abruptly with a curse, to the chorus of female laughter. The night's activities came rushing back to him as he tried to cover himself and look for his pants at the same time. The two Sentinels that had been standing over him a few minutes ago eyed him with an appreciative stare. He felt the tips of his ears grow hot as he finally found his pants and jammed his feet into the legs.

"Enjoy your show, ladies?" he said as he stood, cinching the waist. He crossed his arms and gave them a playful stare, trying to draw attention away from his obvious embarrassment.

"Put it away, soldier." A bored voice came from behind the other Sentinels, who straightened their stance. "Yours isn't the first we've seen today, and it won't be the last." The captain that had met them at the dock stepped forward with a long-suffering look on her face. "Lovers under every bush. I hate this holiday."

She raised her long eyebrows and looked pointedly behind Elforen's shoulder. "And you can put that away too, girl, we're not here to lock you up."

Elforen glanced over his shoulder to see Zarabethe, rather than scramble for her clothing, had found her boot and withdrawn the dagger hidden it. Her eyes blazed molten silver as she crouched close to the ground in an attack stance. She still wore his shirt, which was fortunately long enough to preserve her modesty. Spook had appeared out of nowhere, and picking up on her master's mood, watched the trio of Sentinels through lowered eyelids. Even half-naked and barely armed, she did not look like someone to be trifled with. At the captain's words, she stuck the dagger point down in the dirt, but she did not relax her stance. The captain rolled her eyes and threw her arms up.

"For Light's sake. Just pick somewhere further from the village next time. If I catch you in the act I will lock the two of you up for the night. Separately." She spun on her heels and stalked off, Nevali and Ellah trailing behind her, whispering and giggling to each other. Elforen thought he heard her mumble, "Six more days of this damned holiday" as she rounded the side of a shed and left his sight.

He let out a sigh and chuckled nervously. For a moment, he had really thought they were going to be arrested for public indecency. "We were a little close to town-" he started as he turned back to Zarabethe. She was gone.

"Zara?" He turned in a circle, but she had obviously taken off as soon as the sentinels had made their exit. There was no sign of her. He frowned as he bent to retrieve his belongings. Her clothes were gone too. His mind wandered to the night before as he got dressed. He had been so caught off guard when she had kissed him that he had barely been able to restrain himself properly. He rubbed his hand over his eyes, trying to keep his mind focused. Last night had been exactly what he had wanted, but was it what she really wanted? He tried to remember if he had pushed her too hard too fast, and all he got for it was flushed face and a misbehaving brain. He gave up on that, and tucking the rest of his things under his arm, he headed back towards Feathermoon Village. She had probably snuck to the inn to get dressed.

It was almost two hours before he finally found her perched on a low bench behind the bathhouses. She was meticulously braiding her waist-length hair, turned almost black from being wet into two neat plaits. She was completely dressed in the clothes she had purchased the day before and she nodded at him in a completely neutral way as he approached.

"Where have you been?" he demanded. After not finding her in the inn, he had searched the entire village top to bottom for her. He had even intercepted Nevali and Ellah, who were getting off duty, and endured their teasing to inquire after her. A real seed of worry had buried itself in him that she had been so upset she had left and continued without him. She wrinkled her forehead in confusion at his mood.

"Bathing."

"For two hours?" he asked incredulously. A flicker of embarrassment flashed in her eyes and she tipped her head to the back of the bench, where his damp shirt was draped. "I also washed your shirt for you." Her hands reached the end of her hair, and she started pinning the loops of braids to the base of her neck. "So do you want to head out today, or see one more night of the festival?"

"Wait a minute." He held his hands up and shook his head. He had already been through such a torrent of emotions this morning, embarrassment, worry bordering on panic, and Zarabethe's complete calm to his upheaval was starting to irritate him. "So do you not remember last night, or are you just pretending it didn't happen?"

He got a real reaction this time. She blushed and avoided his eyes as she finished fixing her hair. "I remember."

He started to reach for her, then stopped, then did it anyway. Propriety be damned. "Are you okay?" he asked softly. Her cheeks turned darker red and she stared at her feet, although she did not withdraw her hand from his grasp.

"Yes, I'm fine," she mumbled. He crooked one finger under her chin and tipped her head up to look at him.

"I want a real answer, Zara. Don't just put another wall up," he said sternly. She met his eyes for one moment, and he saw the disquiet there before she pulled away from him. She stared at the trees clustered behind the bathhouses and crossed her arms against the soft leather of her jerkin as Elforen felt his heart start to drop into the pit of his stomach. It felt like an eternity before she spoke.

"I'm confused at myself," she said. "I've never wanted anything like this before. It goes against everything I've ever done to keep myself safe."

She turned and her silver eyes blazed into his. "I don't regret anything. But I am still getting used to feeling like this."

"Like what?" came out of his mouth without a thought to preface it. She watched his face thoughtfully and seemed to stumble through a list of words before speaking.

"Like maybe I don't want to spend the rest of my life alone anymore."

Elforen considered the words for a minute. From anyone else, it might have been an overdramatic statement, but Zara's face was all unmasked honesty, and he knew the admission was from her heart. He reached his hand out, and she took it. He tossed his spare shirt over his shoulder and led the way back towards the inn.

"You don't have to be alone right now. I'm not going anywhere," he told her as they navigated through the streets of town, winding back up for the events of the day. "So south to Tanaris, or more festival tonight?"

"I think I've had enough festival for now," she said with a slightly panicked look on her face. He laughed quietly as he dropped her hand and turned toward her. "I wasn't meaning that, but that's fine too."

She crossed her arms and gave him an exasperated look. "Let's just focus on the quest for now, alright?" she said, sternly trying to pull herself back to her normal state of calm neutrality.

"Tanaris it is," he acquiesced. He reached down to scrub Spook behind the ears before turning back to where she was still standing. She had erased all the vulnerability from her face and she was the picture of unflinching composure. He glanced up at the position of the sun.

"I'll meet you in an hour at the gryphon post," he said, waving as he turned to the inn.


	12. Tanaris

The gryphon ride to Tanaris was more difficult than Zarabethe thought it would be. The more she tried to put the events of the night before out of her mind, the more they started to creep in around the edges. She clung to the gryphon tightly with her thighs and threaded her arm through the leather harness so she could balance the folder containing the confusing blueprints across her lap. This dialect of Draconic was particularly complex, and every time she thought she had made a little headway, the letters twisted again in her mind, and she had to begin anew. The gryphon banked slightly to the left, and it sent a dull ache through her nether regions. That was not helping her concentration as well.

Finally with a sigh, she closed the folder and slipped it back inside the satchel. She ran her hands over the worn dragonhide as her thoughts drifted away from her again. The hum of magic that emanated from the bag was comforting, like an old friend. She wrapped her arms around the satchel and rested her chin against it. Below her the green expanse of primitive Un'Goro crater stretched before her, lush and wild. At the edge of the horizon, the desert of Tanaris was just barely visible. Mostly a rough, sandy wasteland, the only high point of civilization was the goblin-run town of Gadgetzan. Far on the eastern edge, near the sea, was the Caverns of Time, the dominion of the Bronze Dragonflight. A brief flicker of pain ran through her as she remembered what transpired there. It had been months since then, and she felt no closer to finding the Scepter than she was then. The blue scepter shard seemed nearly unreachable, and she hadn't even started on the other two.

She squinted and caught a glimpse of Elforen's gryphon just ahead of her. Not for the first time this trip, she took a minute to try and discern what she felt about things between the two of them. Her mind became overwhelmed with a swirl of images and emotions, and then just went momentarily blank. She rubbed her hands across her face and tried again. There was embarrassment, yes, a lot of that. Fondness, gratitude that he traveled with her, and a desire for him to stay. On the other side though, fear of becoming too dependent, a vulnerability from opening up to him. Giving some of her safety net over to his keeping. She leaned forward and rested her forehead on the velvety soft feathers of the gryphon's neck. She took a long, deep breath. Trying to puzzle out her feelings for her travel companion made her stomach hurt and her head completely run away from her.

Trust and vulnerability, those were the two things it boiled down to, wasn't it? She had tried to trust people before. Being solitary sometimes got to her, and she tried to open up. She'd even managed to have a brief relationship once, although it didn't work out at all. A novice druid had paid her an unreasonable amount of attention during her training with the Sentinels. That was many years ago, between the second War of the Shifting Sands and Northrend. She had taken a leap and honestly tried to return affections. When he had tried to kiss her though, she compulsively swiped a hand across her mouth every time afterward, and she could never let him too close. When Elforen kissed her...she blushed and laughed softly. Obviously it tampered with her self-control.

She stole a glance below. The vast desert of Tanaris rolled under her feet and the sun was baking over her head. They would be landing soon, and she would need to get her head together.

Back in Northrend, she had trusted Elforen with her life, hadn't she? They had formed a working partnership, and they hadn't let each other down. Existing alongside him was as easy as breathing. And he had taken care of her when she was injured in Feralas, even when she didn't want him to. Why was it so hard to trust him with her heart?

She took a deep breath in and stomped down on her rising anxiety. It is pointless to be fearful of our relationship, she told herself firmly. This was nothing serious, just an extension of what they already had. She didn't have to sort it all out now. They had plenty to do, plenty to think about, and an enormous quest to focus on. She would worry about any other implications later.

Her stomach lurched into her throat as the gryphon banked sharply and started to descend. As its speed slowed, the desert heat trickled in through the wind that had been cooling her face. By the time it had landed, she was ready to get out of the sun already. She secured her bags and gear, and stumbled gracelessly off the beast. She stood and stretched: the flight had taken the better part of the day and she was stiff from head to foot. At the next gryphon stall, she could see Elforen do the same. They might as well secure rooms at the inn and head north to see this "psychic" tomorrow morning.

*****

Elforen groaned and pulled the coverlet over his eyes as he grew aware of the light trickling through his eyelids. He had fallen asleep quickly last night, grateful for the comfortable bed, but he was not ready to be up yet. He wondered if Zarabethe was awake yet. She had still been up, sitting on her bed reading when he had wrapped up in his blanket and gone to sleep. They had a problem with getting the room situated that way: the stout goblin innkeeper could not understand why they wanted one room with two beds. He made a leering face as he said this, and Elforen had seen Zarabethe's ears turn pink as she stammered for a reply. That was when Elforen had stepped in and insisted, but thankfully the issue had not come between them. She still seemed to be comfortable around him, laughing and talking over dinner, and right before they went to bed, she smiled when he planted a chaste kiss on the top of her head.

He pulled a corner of the blanket off his face and peered into the faintly lit room. The shadows indicated the light was from within. He rolled over and saw a candle burning on the small nightstand by Zarabethe's bed. The night elf was hunched over a pile of scrolls and two open books, scribbling furiously on a separate parchment. He could just barely see the shadow of a sleeping Spook under her bed. He sat up and glanced outside: it was still full dark, although the dawn would be upon them soon.

"Zara, have you been up all night?" he mumbled, his mouth still full of sleep. She didn't even glance his way.

"No." She stopped writing long enough to run one finger along a line of words in one of the books, her lips moving silently as she read them to herself. "There's still night left."

He groaned and flopped back down on the bed, pulling the blanket over him again.

"Go to bed, Zarabethe, you can do that in the morning," he grumbled.

"I will shortly," came her distracted answer. Giving up, Elforen stuck his head under the pillow and sought sleep.

*****

"Are you going to sleep all morning?"

It was definitely daylight this time. He peeked one eye out from under the pillow at the night elf sitting across from him with a slight smirk on her face. He pulled the pillow back down.

"No, there's still morning left," he retorted. The pillow was yanked unceremoniously off his face.

"Come on, I got us breakfast," Zarabethe said, turning her chair over to the small table. It was laden with a plate of pastries and a mug of coffee. She was holding one mug and sipped from it as Elforen pulled himself from bed. He yawned and tried to run his hand through his bed-tossled hair as he plopped down on the other chair across from her. He saw Zarabethe flick her eyes to his hair and a full smile brush her lips as he took a drink of his coffee.

"Would you like a hair tie?" she asked innocently.

"No." His reply was grumpier than he intended, and he tried to smooth his errant mane with one hand. "Why are you so chipper this morning? I know you didn't get any sleep."

She leaned behind her and snagged a paper off of a stack on her bed. She held it up, and he saw that she had written a few lines of Common under some of the instructions on the blueprints. "I finally got a partial breakthrough on translating the blue dialect of Draconic. I was only able to make out a few words, but I've at least got a start now."

"So, did you sleep at all?" he asked, grabbing one of the pastries. She waved his question away. She was staring at the paper, tapping one of the lines with one finger, already getting absorbed in translating again. He rolled his eyes and ate his breakfast.

They were on their way north before the sun was high overhead. With a full stomach and seated comfortable on a rented raptor mount, Elforen found himself in much better spirits. Neither of them were sure how far Narain's house was, so they packed for a few days. Spook trotted along behind them, giving the mounts a wary eye. Zarabethe had rescued Spook from Drakkari Trolls in Northrend, and Elforen guessed the raptors reminded her of them. When the sun reached its zenith in the sky and the heat grew near unbearable, the two night elves erected a small shelter in the shadow of a cluster of rocks. They sipped water and leaned drowsily against the rock, shoulder to pauldron. Spook lapped some water from Zarabethe's canteen and lay panting in the shade. They talked sparsely, but in a lull of quiet Elforen glanced over and realized Zarabethe had leaned her head over and fallen asleep on his shoulder. He leaned his own head back and dozed through the midday heat. After a few hours, he roused Zarabethe, and they continued the trek north.

Near evening, they spotted a small house of gnomish design tucked into the side of a cluster of hills in northern Tanaris. They pushed their mounts faster, and reached it right as the orb of the sun started to dip behind the mountains. They dismounted, and Elforen secured both raptors to a post in front of the house as Zarabethe approached the door.

*****

Zarabethe paused a moment before she knocked and read the sign above the small door. Narain Soothfancy, Amazing Psychic and Part-time Engineer. She exchanged a glance with Elforen and attempted to hide the smirk on her face before rapping sharply on the doorframe.

"Coming, coming!" came a voice from within. The voice grew closer as it spoke. "The Great and Powerful Narain senses that you are here for..." At that he flung the door open dramatically and blinked in surprise. "Oh, Night Elves. I could have sworn you were members of my fan club."

Narain was short in stature as all gnomes were, and was dressed in a garish robe of scarlet, gold, and black. A matching red turban was perched on his round head, and dark brown hair stuck out in tufts from underneath it. His eyes were a little too shiny, and he had a friendly expression plastered on his mustachioed face. He waved them inside cheerfully. "Well come on in then, no point in standing outside."

Zarabethe beckoned outside to Elforen, then ducked inside the gnome's house, Spook on her heels. The comfortable living area was piled with cushions and overstuffed chairs of dramatic colors surrounding a small table holding a large glass ball. The windows had been covered, and the only light was from a single enchanted lantern hanging above the table. To the contrary, the other side of the room, the kitchen, was festooned with bright lights and decorated with cherry-printed curtains and towels. Zarabethe couldn't see into the other rooms through the narrow hallway, but she assumed they were all as uniquely adorned as these two. Behind her she heard Elforen's boots on the floor.

"So, what can I do for you two?" came a voice at her elbow. She tried not to visibly jump at his close presence and started to take the satchel off her head. The gnome's entire countenance changed.

"Ooo! A magical artifact to decipher! Bring it in here under the light!" The gnome dashed into the small kitchen and shoved a pile of mail off of his table. Zarabethe opened the satchel and retrieved the folder from Azuregos. She handed it to the gnome, who was practically squealing with delight.

"Blueprints from Azuregos! Even better! I haven't had anything complicated to construct in forever!" Narain started to skim the contents of the folder, mumbling numbers and parts under his breath. He drew his bushy eyebrows together and pursed his lips in thought.

"Why did Azuregos write these instructions in Draconic? He knows I can't read a lick of it without a translation! Dragons," he said, as if the word explained it all.

Zarabethe cleared her throat pointedly and pointed to where she had written in the margins of the paper. "Actually, I've managed to make some headway here on translating. It's a difficult dialect, but I have a head for languages-"

The gnome brushed her off with a wave of his hand. "Translating it without a key is impossible, the blues never make anything easy. Thank you for trying, though," he added with a bright smile.

Zarabethe bit her lip against an aggravated retort and tried again. "I compared it to a copy of an old creation myth written in Draconic, and I've found some similarities, enough to start.." She wasn't able to finish stating what she had started, because Narain patted her on the arm and she nearly ran into Elforen, she jumped back so quickly.

"My, you're a jumpy one, aren't you?" he opined. "And so eager to help as well! Imagine a big, tough, adventuring type being fluent in Draconic!" The gnome chuckled to himself. He tried to pat her on the arm again, but Zarabethe had drawn back out of his reach. He gave her what she supposed was a winning smile, but it only made her ears burn hotter. "Don't you worry your pretty head about the intellectual details, my dear. You just have to be in charge of getting everything I need to get started creating your spectacular feat of engineering."

The gnome produced a scroll and a writing implement and started to make an orderly list. Zarabethe stared daggers into his absurd red turban. How dare he insinuate that she was little more than hired muscle? Elforen, sensing her mood, pulled her back behind him and took the position of point. She fumed silently as he collected the list from Narain.

"Now, I will need three very important things before I can begin," continued the gnome as if he didn't notice the change of conversationalists. "First of all, I will need my scrying goggles. That much is clear from the blueprints. I lent them to a friend of mine who unfortunately, has yet to return them. He lives near Silverpine Forest. I've included his name and address here, so don't lose it!"

The gnome blinked, glancing up at Elforen's face as if he just realized he was different than the person he had been talking to moments before. He shook his head and pointed to the next paragraph on the scroll.

"Ah, yes, and second, of course, I will be needing my translating book, Draconic for Dummies. It is a very coveted book, you see: only a few copies were made before the dragonflights threw a hissy fit and forbade it to be printed again. I hid it on a deserted island south of Tanaris. I have a magical boat you can take to get there, as it's too far to swim."

Narain paused, and he wet his lips before he continued. "Now the final item, and the one you must retrieve first, is the most important of all. You see, a genius and psychic such as myself has a very delicate digestion, and I must have the proper food to be able to concentrate and work my mechanical magic." His eyes gleamed greedily as he took out a second parchment and inscribed a note in his neat handwriting. "Take this letter to Dirge Quickcleave, in Gadgetzan. A particularly unremarkable goblin as far as intellect, but a masterful chef. He has completed orders for me in the past, it should be a simple matter to pick up what I need."

Elforen handed the scroll and parchment to Zarabethe to slip inside the satchel. Narain jumped down off of his stool and dashed into one of the back rooms. Within moments he returned, carrying a drawstring leather bag. Zarabethe could feel the magic radiating off of it as he handed it to Elforen. It was a different sort of arcane than the satchel, and it glowed with a sickening blue-green light when he opened the bag to peer inside.

"These are portals, to make your journey easier. I'm afraid they will only return you to Gadgetzan, but that way you can come right back as you retrieve my belongings."

Elforen thanked him, and the gnome beamed at the two night elves as they ducked out of the low doorway.

"I look forward to your return!" he called cheerfully after them, before retreating inside his home to avoid the gathering dusk.

Zarabethe roughly pulled the reins of the rented raptor off of the peg it was tied on. "That self-important...condescending...know-it-all...dim inutive...arrrrgh!" She couldn't even vocalize her frustration properly. "Sending us chasing after books, and goggles, and...food!" She turned to Elforen, who looked suspiciously like he was trying not to smile. "I could have that text translated twice in the time it will take to gather everything. Silverpine Forest? That's not even on this continent!"

Her senses already heightened by her aggravation, she heard a familiar shushing sound of scales against sand behind and to the right of her. Tracking it in her head as she turned, she drew her bow and in one movement impaled a large desert scorpion through the torso with a green-fletched arrow. It twitched for a moment, and Zarabethe felt a little of her frustration leech out of her. She blew air out of her nostrils, shifting strands of her hair off her face. She retrieved the arrow, scraping the ichor off the point before she returned it to her quiver. Elforen waited for her on his raptor.

"Feel better?" he asked casually. He still looked far too amused at her irritation. She sighed and pulled herself up onto her own raptor.

"Let's just get back to Gadgetzan," she said listlessly.

*****

It took some hunting the next day, but the two night elves found the goblin chef working in the back of a seedy looking diner that they hadn't dared try in their brief stay in Gadgetzan. He wiped something blue off his hands and took the paper Zarabethe handed him. Instead of reading it, Dirge squinted up at the two of them, then to the side at their gear and clothing, and finally sighed and dropped his arm down.

"This is an order from Narain Soothfancy, isn't it." It wasn't a question, and he didn't need them to answer. He crumpled up the paper and threw it near an overflowing trashcan. "I hate that guy. Every few weeks he gets some mush-headed adventurer to believe he needs this particular food to do their bidding. Well, I am all out," he said firmly, returning to the table that he was preparing orders at.

Zarabethe connected eyes with Elforen. What would they do if Dirge refused to fill the order? Her thoughts were interrupted by the goblin, who continued to talk as he fried something horrid-smelling in a green sauce.

"This recipe was handed down to me by my grandfather, and it requires two special ingredients. You need a gallon of goblin rocket fuel," he kicked an empty can out from under the table, "which I'm out of."

"You also need to capture a giant type of bird called a Chimaerok."

Elforen had a confused look on his face but Zarabethe felt her heart sink. Of course it would be a chimaerok.

"If we acquire those two things for you, will you fill the order for Narain?" she asked. The goblin waved one hand dismissively.

"Yeah, yeah, as long as I don't have to catch the stinking thing I'll cook it for you. It doesn't have to be alive when you bring it here, just make sure it's fresh."

Elforen followed her as she strode quickly out of the smokey kitchen. "What's a chimaerok?" he asked, squinting into the sunlight.

"It's an ancient breed of bird that's only found in one area of Feralas, in the southernmost jungle," she said. "I've never caught one or even seen one, but if he cooks them regularly, they must exist."

"How big of a bird are we talking here?"

"Think 500 lb smarter-than-usual chicken with a terrible smell."

"Wonderful," answered Elforen. He glanced up at the sun high overhead. "So gryphons again?"

"Might as well," Zarabethe shrugged as they returned to the underground inn to pack. "By the time we're through with this quest I might even be used to them."


End file.
